BARRY-BASED Wales football manager Jayne Ludlow has been awarded an MBE is the Queen’s Birthday Honours List for services to women's football in Wales.

The 40-year-old mum is the current Wales Women's National Team manager and over the last four years has successfully transformed the fortunes of the national teams (the National A Team, U19s and U17s) with national and international success.

Her huge contribution to raising the profile of women’s football in Wales has been from grassroots to Welsh international levels and she has, at every opportunity, promoted the game in the media.

Mrs Ludlow said she was shocked to receive the notification that she’d been awarded and MBE.

“I was shocked.

"It’s lovely, but it not just for me – this is all about other people.

“It’s a little bit surreal.

"I look at this and just don’t believe it.”

She gained her first full international cap, aged 17, and became part of an elite group of footballers to reach more than 50 caps, finishing her playing career with 61, in 2012.

Mrs Ludlow was a professional footballer for the Reading and Arsenal women’s teams and during her Arsenal career she was an integral member of the team that won a domestic ‘triple’ (Premier League, FA Cup and League Cup) before winning an unprecedented quadruple which includes the UEFA Champions League, Premier League, FA Cup and League Cup.

She was awarded the Football Associations Player’s Player of the Year three times between 2001 and 2004 and she had the honour of being appointed the ambassador for the UEFA Women’s Champions League Final, staged in Cardiff in June 2017.

She has also been inducted into the Wales Sports Hall of Fame and she has worked diligently in transforming the elite pathway for ambitious female footballers in Wales.

Her continued, tireless work has cemented her legacy of being the person that has elevated women’s football in Wales to be the most participated women’s and girls’ team sport.

She was awarded the BBC Wales Sports Personality coach of the year in December 2018.