George Ryan, who has retired as bridge correspondent of The Irish Times after 44 years, has received a special lifetime award for services to the game.

Fearghal O’Boyle, president of the Contract Bridge Association of Ireland, presented him with the association’s President’s Award given each year to someone who has made an outstanding contribution to bridge.

Kevin O'Sullivan, editor of The Irish Times, said Mr Ryan was long established as one of Ireland's best bridge players when he joined the newspaper. "He was a fearless, freewheeling, imaginative player rather than a strict percentages man."

As well as winning several of the most important Irish championships in the 1960s and early 1970s, he was the author of two best-selling bridge instruction books, The Bones of Bridge and Some Flesh on the Bones. He also wrote a number of comic novels, one of which, No Time for Work, sold 15,000 copies in the late 1970s and was reprinted in 2004.

Mr O’Sullivan said attention to detail was a Ryan hallmark. “He was particularly scrupulous about checking the spelling of names, often making a couple of phone calls to contacts anywhere in Ireland to make sure he had them right.”

The new bridge correspondent is Seamus Dowling, who is a master player and former president of the bridge association, who has already covered several international bridge championships for The Irish Times. He has played on many representative teams for Ireland, Dublin and the association.

He is the author of the definitive history of Irish bridge, Thank You, Partner, published five years ago. More recently, he has edited a collection of hands played by Irish players.

“His even temper and good humour have served him well, both an administrator and at the bridge tables, where he has always been an easy and popular partner,” Mr O’Sullivan remarked.

Mr Dowling's first weekly column will appear in The Irish Times next Tuesday.