Squash Australia hope badminton ace Richard Vaughan will be a smash hit
By STEVE WALTON – Squash Mad Australia
Here’s my latest video blog from Outback Australia. As long as we can get connected, there’s no hiding from Squash Mad Australia as we bring you the latest news from Down Under.
This week we are poised to welcome a new Chief Executive to Squash Australia. He is Richard Vaughan, who won a bronze medal for Wales in the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester, that lovely northern English city which is home to the England Squash head office and national centre.
Richard (right) has competed at the highest level, reaching a best world ranking of seven and competing at both the 200 and 2004 Olympic Games.
We look forward to his input into the Australian squash scene as we seek to develop the sport at local, national and international level.
Here is his background, courtesy of Wikipedia.
Richard Vaughan (born 16 April 1978) is a Welsh badminton player from Llanbradach, Caerphilly, Wales.[2] Vaughan is currently the Chief Executive of Badminton Ireland and has a MBA from Leicester University; MA Sports Development from Bath University, having previously achieved a BSc(Hons) in Economics and Politics. Vaughan married Piret Hamer (Vaughan) on 2 May 2008, in Tallinn, Estonia.
Richard Vaughan won a bronze medal at the 2000 European Badminton Championships losing to Peter Gade (Denmark) in the semi-final. He also won a bronze medal at the 2002 Commonwealth Games, beating Susilo (Singapore), and Gupta (India) on the way to the semi final where he lost to Lee (Malaysia). His highest world ranking was number 7 (2002).
To date he has 107 caps representing Wales (March 2009). He manages the Richard Vaughan Badminton Academy. Vaughan competed in both the 2000 and 2004 Olympic Games.
Here is his profile on the Badminton Ireland website:
Richard Vaughan joined Badminton Ireland in 2011 as Chief Executive Officer and, since then, has overseen the introduction of a number of innovative programmes among them the ‘Shuttletime’ schools project, the development of a National Badminton Training Centre in Dublin, www.BadmintonIreland.TV and funding initiatives including www.Badminton-eShop.com.
As a former British badminton No.1 and world No.7, Richard competed at the Sydney 2000 and Athens 2004 Olympic Games and won European and Commonwealth medals.
When his playing career was over, he worked for Badminton Europe and the Badminton World Federation in relation to Continental high performance systems, coach education and development pathways. He joined Badminton Ireland from Gravit-e, a digital marketing company where he was an account director.
Richard has a BSc in Economics and Politics, an MA in Coach Education and Development from Bath University and a MBA (Marketing) from Leicester University.