ALEX WOODYARD says picking up the SportsBeat Young Player of the Year award caps a wonderful season.
The 23-year-old pulled the strings for surprise package Braintree Town as the part-timers finished in an unlikely third place in the National League before their promotion dream was cruelly ended in extra-time of the play-off semi-final against Grimsby Town.
Woodyard’s busy and intelligent performances in midfield saw his Iron boss Danny Cowley name him the club’s player of the year.
And The NLP readers felt the England C captain was equally deserving in a strong category that featured Braintree team-mate Sim Akinola, Swindon-bound Woking midfielder John Goddard, Dover duo Sean Raggett and Sam Magri as well as Maidstone striker Dumebi Dumaka.
“It feels brilliant,” Woodyard said. “It wraps up a great season with the award – it’s a great privilege to be seen as the Young Player of the Year.
“It was a tough category with some great players nominated. Sim, John Goddard’s just joined Swindon, so it’s being up against players like that makes it even better.
“I’ve also been told Lee Angol won this award last year and now he’s playing at Peterborough, and Andre Gray has won it too. So there’s definitely a pathway there. I’ve just got to keep working hard to achieve what I want to achieve.
“This season has been great. Everyone wants to be at a club that is successful and we were at Braintree.
“I think a lot of people looked at us and said, ‘Cor, how did Braintree do it?’ But we’ve got good players. We might be Braintree Town – supposedly a small name – but we had great players pulling on the shirt.
“It’s a miracle in the sense that we are part-time, but you’ve also got to look at it that we’ve got good players too.”
Woodyard, who has been named in Paul Fairclough‘s England C squad for next Sunday’s home International Challenge Trophy game against Slovakia at Sutton United, also paid tribute to Danny and Nicky Cowley for helping turnaround his career at Concord Rangers and Braintree in the last two seasons.
“Their names are getting bigger and bigger,” Woodyard said about the new Lincoln City management team. “If you see the work they do at training and behind the scenes, it’s phenomenal. Not a lot of people in Non-League are as committed as they are and that’s why they’re going from strength to strength.
“No disrespect but I’d never heard of Concord Rangers before I went there. I hadn’t been enjoying my football and I really didn’t know what I was going to do. Thankfully I found Danny and Nicky who have helped me massively on my way.”
