TALENTED sportspeople across the Vale will receive support thanks to the Sports Academy Scheme to help them focus on training.

The scheme, which sees the Vale of Glamorgan Council join forces with Legacy Leisure, will offer successful Academy members the chance to use council-owned leisure facilities taking away the financial burden related to their training.

One of the successful members is 18-year-old Matilda Matthews, from Barry, who has competed for Team GB.

She has competed at the Sailing 420 World Championships, and at the World Cup – a competition that Olympic silver medallist, Hannah Mills, of Dinas Powys, also competed at – as well as the Junior World Championships.

Miss Matthew’s ambition for 2017/18 is to retain her GB selection, and make the step from Youth to Olympic squad.

Other successful Sports Academy members include international discus throwers, a wrestler aiming for 2018 Commonwealth Games, a GB surf lifesaving champion, a British champion sprint kayaker aiming for the Commonwealth Games and the Olympics, GB sailors, and a Taekwondo international ranked second in Great Britain.

The council’s sports and play development manager, Karen Davies, said: “The Vale is fortunate to have a large number of residents competing at a very high level, meaning there was high competition for the limited spaces available on the scheme.

“All of the successful applicants are Welsh internationals and Welsh squad members in their respective sports, with a number of them competing for Great Britain.”

Cllr Gwyn John, the council’s cabinet member for visible, leisure and regulatory services, said of the Academy scheme: “It was an extremely difficult task for the panel members to select who would take up the coveted spaces.

“It is fantastic, however, to see such tremendous talent coming out of the Vale of Glamorgan, much of which has been nurtured by the strong sports clubs we have in our county.

“We hope that their membership with the Sports Academy will assist them in their sporting careers.”

Sports Academy membership is decided on a yearly basis, with all 2017 spaces now occupied.

Applications for membership for the 2018 period will be accepted around October.