Player of the Season 2015/16

A disappointing season for London Irish but we should still honour the efforts put-in by the team. We had a few good results amongst the (sadly many) failures and a number of players left-nothing in the tank in various games.

As ever The Craic awards its Player of the Season crown* to the man who recieves the most Man of the Match awards over the season. This gives a full-season view rather than simply rewarding end-of-season efforts and has thrown-up some surprising changes from the traditional end-of-season awards. This year with its many disappointments has been reflected with a much wider and shallower choice of players - more people won fewer awards. Last season's winner (Shane) took 5 awards, this season we had to hold a vote to split two guys on three awards!

So, the honourable mentions:

Single MoTM Awards

There were a good crop of single awards: One each for "The Pack" and "The Team" were joined by Andrew Fenby, Chris Noakes, Ciraran Hearn, Darren Alinson, Gerard Ellis, Matt Symonds, Sean Maitland, Shane Geraghty (denying him his PoTS hat-trick for at least a year) and Topsy Ojo.

Dual Awards (joint Third Place)

The four men to get two awards this season all hold joint third place! Blair Cowan, Brendan McKibbin, Johnny Williams and Luke Narraway joined the dreaded "None of the Above" in this feat - a clear indication that we had a bit of a mare this term.

Second Place (Three Awards)

Second place goes to a guy who, when on-song, actually looked like he'd have a go at keeping us in the premiership on his own. He's since been away (with Johnny Williams) at the U20 World Championships, sadly picking-up a serious injury on the way to claiming the win for England. Get well soon Alex Lewington, a real star and hopefully someone who'll relish an early return for us to the Premiership even if he'll actually not take much of a part in the coming struggle for promotion.

Player of the Season

Also with three awards but then winning the popular vote is our awardee this season - David Paice. Not a massive surprise and you do have to feel for Alex coming-up against club stalwart and hero Paicey in a two horse race amongst supporters. David has probably "bled green" most of our players this year - at times he seemed to want to carry the whole team. Many congratulations to a long-serving and very deserving player, keep it up Mr Paice, we'll need your steel in coming months.

*Not an actual crown (sorry David)