Matt gets his sporting chance
Undergraduate English Literature student Matthew Nixon has been voted the Guardian's student sports writer of the year.
Matthew, who is from Hartlepool and currently lives in Fallowfield, entered the Sports Journalist of the Year category over the summer by submitting four features from the previous year, which were originally published in Manchester's student newspaper Student Direct.
A student on the Centre for New Writing's undergraduate fiction-writing course, he was selected after impressing BBC Sports Editor Mihir Bose, Daily Mail Chief Sports Writer Paul Hayward and Guardian Sports Editor Ben Clissitt.
According to Hayward, sports-mad Matthew was "streets ahead" of the three other short-listed entrants chosen from across the country. His articles tackled the thorny issue of charity in sport, put up a case for defending footballers' wages and reported from the Caribbean where he watched the Cricket World Cup.
The Hartlepool United fan launched his career in sports journalism at his local paper the Hartlepool Mail, where he completed a week's work experience at the age of 15. He now hopes to fulfil his life-long ambition of working as a national newspaper reporter.
He said: "I've always wanted to be a journalist, so to achieve this level of success has been incredible. It brings me one step closer to fulfilling my ambition of writing for a national newspaper.
"And it's thrilling to follow in the footsteps of such illustrious names as Andrew Rawnsley, Jonathan Freedland, Emily Barr and Mark Frith who are previous winners."
His teacher at the Centre, 2006 Booker short-listed novelist Maria Hyland, said: "Both his intelligence and talent were obvious from the first meeting. Matthew is a great pleasure to teach and an utterly deserving winner."