North Village striker Jonté Smith capped a fine season by edging out Paget’s Diaje Hart and Kashe Hall, of St George’s, to claim the Premier Division Most Valuable Player honour before a packed audience at the Bermuda Football Association’s annual awards ceremony at Pier 6 on Saturday night.

Smith, who helped his side to achieve the Premier Division and FA cup double in his first season after returning to the club from St George’s, expressed his surprise at winning the award

“More than anything, I am thankful to receive this award,” Smith said.

“It was a great season for the team as a whole and I just tried my best to play my part and was fortunate enough to get recognised. I was a bit surprised to receive this award as there was a lot of talent in the division especially with Diaje scoring the most goals but overall I am grateful for the award”.

Village dominated the major awards of the evening with Smith’s team-mate and captain Detre Bell claiming the best goalkeeper award, while Calvin “Patches” Dill received the Coach of the Year award. The team showed that they were also gentlemen on the field as they won the Fair Play award with the fewest cards in the division.

When picking up his award Bell gave a nod to his predecessors.

“I am happy to see this,” he said. “From Kentoine Jennings to Keith Jennings to Jamiko Jennings, it’s nice to see North Village back to winning team and individual awards. That is just the Village way.”

Although he started the season as assistant to Kenny Thompson, Dill finished with the Premier Division’s top trophy for coaches.

“First, I wish to give thanks to my wife for her continued support and encouragement,” Dill said. “Second, I wish to thank my team for committing to the cause as they created this for me. It is a pleasure to win the award and I am looking forward to next year for us to build on this.”

Julian Carpenter, of Paget, won the Premier Division defender of the year with PHC’s T’ysi Showers named young player of the year.

Paul Simons, striker for First Division champions X-Roads, won the First Division MVP award and knew he stood a good chance of coming away with an award.

“I didn’t want to get ahead of myself but I wasn’t surprised,” Simons said. ”I knew my name would be in the running as we had a good season, but I didn’t think it was guaranteed.”

Despite X-Roads winning the First Division title, it was players from runners-up Boulevard who won most of the remaining awards up for grabs.

Darius Cox was named the division’s best defender, with Deaz Chambers voted Goalkeeper of the Year and Troy Smith awarded the top coach honour. Sami Carolo, from Robin Hood, was named young player of the year.

Jenay Edness-Gomez, 34, proved that age is just a number as she won her second Women’s MVP Award after winning for the first time at 17.

“I want to congratulate all the nominees as I have played with them for some years,” Edness-Gomez said.

“I am humbled by the award having won the award in 2007-08 season as captain and to be captain now and win it again is amazing.”

Samantha Davis and Kalay Hollis, who both play for PHC, picked up the goalkeeper and defensive player of the year, with Somerset’s Koa Goodchild winning young player of the year and Kalila Daley picking up the top goalscorer award

New Fifa official Amaury Majors was named referee of the year, with Rhys Pedro and Dash Bailey picking up youth awards.

Former players Sakena Clarke, Erskine “Choe” Smith, Cecil Robinson and Garrett “Punchy“ Dill were acknowledged as the BFA’s 2025 Legends and will have financial scholarships named in their honour.

The evening started with opening remarks by BFA president Mark Wade and also in attendance were sports minister Owen Darrell and Concacaf president Victor Montagliani, who spoke highly of the potential of Bermuda’s senior men’s team and wished them well in their World Cup qualifying matches next month.

Dale Butler, a former sports minister, was one of the recipients of the Order of Merit Award and was recognised as giving the national team the nickname of the Gombey Warriors.

BFA chairman of competitions Shannon Burgess also presented cheques to the league and cup-winning teams.

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