New for the 2020/2021 seasonPost tournament photo with the teams in front of a banner putting their hands in the air.

Goalball UK is launching its new Club of the Season award to celebrate the monumental effort made by clubs up and down the country.

The prize will be awarded to a club that has gone above and beyond to help transform lives of people who are blind and partially sighted.

During what has been an unprecedented and difficult time, clubs have been at the forefront providing support and engagement to players, officials and volunteers when we/ they have been unable to play goalball. They have proven their impact goes way beyond the court and this is what the Club of the Season will recognise.

Criteria for entries can be anything that displays the lengths a club goes to which makes a significant contribution to their community – from virtual exercise challenges to planning and delivering a safe return to training, to outreach work within their local region.

The Club of the Season award will sit alongside Keith Lound Service to Sport and the Player of the Season awards at the end of season ceremony, which were won by Hannah Webber and Samantha Gough earlier this year, respectively.

The award will be self-nominated by clubs with the Goalball UK Club and Competitions Committee shortlisting and awarding the winner. More information on the nomination process will be announced in 2021.

Tom Dobson, Club and Competitions officer at Goalball UK, said: “This year we have witnessed just how remarkable goalball clubs are – even when we have been unable to play the sport as much as we would have hoped.

“Goalball clubs offer so much more than an opportunity to play the sport, they create communities and bring people together in such a unique way.

“We truly believe this is an area of the sport that we must celebrate and we hope that each member of the goalball family will join us in shouting from the rooftops about these outstanding achievements.”