Beechwood Hockey Festival Guernsey March 2011

St George's annual visit to Beechwood's hockey festival took place on Saturday 19th March.  A mixed team of five girls and five boys took the short flight to Guernsey.  It was a beautiful clear, sunny day and we had a good view of St George's as we flew north to our sister isle.

The first match was against a team of Year 7 and 8 from Stroud.  This was a hard first game to shake the children out of their jet lag!!  It was a very defensive game but Jack Nicholls as centre forward had one chance to score, which he did, neatly slotting the ball past Stroud's goalkeeper.  However, Stroud emerged eventual winners 3:1.

The second game was against Beechwood Maoris.  This was a very even match, mid-fielders Megan Hollyman, Laura Bailey and Jamie McIntosh combined well and provided Jack Nicholls with some good passes, one of which he converted in a one on one with the goalkeeper.  Beechwood fought back and equalised making the final result 1:1.

The next game against a Year 7 & 8 Ladies College side was St George's best performance of the day.  Everyone played well and especially the two backs Thor Tiefenthal and Michael Borman who dealt calmly with several attacks from the Ladies.  Jessie Gallay and Max Bouten supported Jack in attack who again scored both goals in the 2:0 win; however, the most exciting moment of this match was a spectacular stick save by goalkeeper Anais Cooke who reacted quickly to a flick shot which she deftly deflected away from the goal. 

A nil all draw was the result against Cheltenham Turks.  Anais Cooke again made several crucial saves and the whole team defended well to hold this strong team to a goalless draw.  Another 0: 0 draw was the result of the next game against Beechwood Saxons.  St George's had several attempts on goal with Ben Daniels supporting Jack well; however, neither team could score.  In the final game against Cheltenham Navvies St George's worked hard against a strong team who moved the ball quickly from end to end.  Thor Tiefenthal again played a composed game as right defence, calmly tackling and clearing the ball and getting the whole team out of sticky situations.  Eventually tired legs allowed the Navvies a chance and they went on to win 1: 0.

This festival gives St George's hockey team the chance to play against teams from England and older children and the team's improvement throughout the day is always noticeable.  To finish the day we all went bowling before returning tired and happy back home.