Harlequins fly-half Nick Evans has been named the Computacenter Players' Player of the Year at the RPA awards.
Quins fly-half claims players' player award
Harlequins fly-half Nick Evans received the perfect boost ahead the Aviva Premiership final after he was named the Computacenter Players' Player of the Year.
Evans beat off competition from team-mate Chris Robshaw, the Aviva Premiership Player of the Year, and Northampton centre George Pisi - while another Quins star, Mike Brown, was also in the running.
And former All Black Evans is hoping to follow up the award with victory over Leicester at Twickenham on Saturday.
Evans said: "I was very surprised and humbled to win this award, it's a great honour to be voted for by your fellow professionals. I was up against some fantastic players. Mike, Chris, Steve and George have all been outstanding this season and just to be nominated amongst that group is a huge honour in itself.
"Harlequins is a big machine and myself, Chris and Mike are all just small parts of that, we can't do our jobs unless everyone else in the team is doing theirs.
"I've got great respect and admiration for all the guys on the team and they've made my job easy this year and it's great to see so many Quins' players nominated. We've had a fantastic season so far and hopefully we can finish the job at Twickenham on Saturday."
Honour
Saracens star Owen Farrell collected the LV= Young Player of the Year award at the RPA dinner in London.
Farrell, who also picked up the Young Player of the season trophy at the Aviva Premiership Rugby awards, said: "It's a massive honour just to be nominated never mind win this award, especially as it's voted for by your fellow professionals.
"These are the guys you play against week in, week out and all you want to do is earn their respect.
"It's so humbling to win as you can receive all the praise in the world, but to earn this kind of accolade from other Premiership players is fantastic."
Farrell edged out Gloucester duo Jonny May and Freddie Burns in the voting.
The other awards on the night went to Hugh Vyvyan (TAG Heuer Special Merit Award), Mathew Turner (HSBC England Sevens Player of the Year), Alex Bennett (The RPA Blyth Spirit Award in association with Towergate tlc), Ben Skirving (Aviva Player Development Award) and Michael Claassens (The Sunday Times Try of the Year).
World Cup winner Jason Robinson was also honoured, with the former dual-code international induced into the RPA Hall of Fame.
