The commentary icon Bruce McAvaney OAM is among announced recipients of a Commonwealth Games Australia Order of Merit in Sydney this evening, as bowler Jack McShane was recognised as the 2025 Emerging Athlete of the Year.<\/p>\n
Joined on the honouree list by Katrina Powell OAM<\/a> and Warwick Forbes OAM<\/a>, McAvaney will lead the Seven Network coverage of Glasgow 2026 from Scotstoun Stadium as athletics action enthrals audiences in Australia and around the world.<\/p>\n He is arguably the \u2018voice of the Games\u2019 having been at the heart of coverage across the Olympic and Commonwealth Games for decades, including the iconic gold medal of Catherine Freeman AC<\/a> at Sydney 2000 and the inspired victory of Olli Hoare<\/a> in the men\u2019s 1500m four years ago at Birmingham 2022.<\/p>\n Powell was recognised for her distinguished contribution to hockey, winning gold at Kuala Lumpur 1998 and bronze at Manchester 2002 as an athlete, before later leading the Hockeyroos to silver as Head Coach at Birmingham 2022.<\/p>\n I\u2019m absolutely floored and honoured to be honoured tonight,\u201d Powell said.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m really proud of the people that I\u2019ve coached and the athletes they\u2019ve become and I\u2019m proud of my own athletics journey where I\u2019ve set goals and worked hard to achieve them.<\/p>\n \u201cHockey mirrors the Commonwealth Games; it\u2019s about family, friendships and teamwork and my journey in coaching was just as varied as my athletic career; I\u2019m super proud and very honoured.<\/p>\n \u201cThese (the Commonwealth Games) are absolutely the friendly Games and the friendships I\u2019ve made across the Commonwealth are outstanding.\u201d<\/p>\n Forbes was honoured for his contribution to gymnastics as both an athlete and coach. He competed at the Edmonton 1978 Games, winning bronze in the men\u2019s team competition, before going on to serve as Gymnastics Head Coach at the Edinburgh 1986, Auckland 1990, Victoria 1994 and Kuala Lumpur 1998 Games.<\/p>\n The Order of Merit complements Life Membership and recognises the outstanding contribution of individuals to the Commonwealth Sport Movement in Australia and across the world.<\/p>\n For McShane, his naming as the 2025 Emerging Athlete of the Year followed a breakthrough season that saw him become the youngest men\u2019s singles world champion at the World Bowls Indoor Championships in Scotland.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve got to be completely honest, I did not expect this at all,\u201d McShane said.<\/p>\n \u201cThank you so much to all my supporters; my parents, my rocks, my partner and wider group of friends and my family who support me.<\/p>\n \u201cTo Bowls Australia, who are doing great things and pushing the sport forward, thank you for all you do and thank you to everyone, it\u2019s great to be celebrating sport in general.\u201d<\/p>\n McShane was recognised alongside fellow finalists for the trophy Richelle Hill (triathlon) and Declan Budd (swimming), both of whom made their mark on the world stage in 2025 to underscore the depth of Australia\u2019s next generation of sporting talent.<\/p>\n Note: McAvaney and Forbes were unable to attend the presentation in Sydney. McAvaney will be awarded his Order of Merit at the 2026 Commonwealth Games, while Forbes will be acknowledged at an appropriate gymnastics occasion in the months ahead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The commentary icon Bruce McAvaney OAM is among announced recipients of a Commonwealth Games Australia Order of Merit…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":685111,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-685110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=685110"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/685110\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/685111"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=685110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=685110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=685110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}