FOUR Tamworth teams tackled the task of switching from outdoors to indoors at the Hockey NSW Under 13s Indoor State Championships in Orange this week with three players recognised for their big efforts.
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Maeve Galvin and Callie Michell were selected in the Hockey NSW Under 13s Girls Indoor State team while Tom Littlejohns was named a shadow player for the boys team.
“I think at that age it’s awesome for them to be able to compete at a high level and be recognised in a sport they work really hard at,” Tamworth 13s girls A coach Abigail Doolan said.
The selections came after promising efforts from the four sides.
While the performances on paper didn’t flatter the sides, the coaches were still impressed by the effort.
All the sides were full of young players and played five games each at the carnival held on November 3-6.
The boys side in division one scored a draw and a win while the boys in division three scored their sole win in their final game.
The division one girls side scored a win and a draw while the girls in division two claimed a draw.
The Tamworth boys in division one came close in most of their matches to finish ninth.
“We were competitive. We had a couple tight games where we couldn’t quite get up,” coach Garry Littlejohns said.
“We went down 4-1 to the eventual winners [Illawarra-South Coast] who then won 7-0 in the final.
“We were in the stronger pool and beat Grafton, which was the equivalent team in the other pool, 5-1 in the finals match.”
For the girls side in division one who drew with New England in their playoff match, also went close to claiming more wins.
“I think we definitely performed better than playing in the seventh and eighth playoff suggests,” Doolan said.
“It was just a shame the side hadn’t played as a team before and at the beginning of the tournament we struggled to score goals.
“We held a lot of possession but we just couldn’t score goals but I think the girls played well as a team.”
For the lower division Tamworth boys and girls teams, the championships were all about development.
Both teams fielded sides made up of mainly younger players.
“We had a very young team, they were all 10 to 11,” 13s boys B coach Greg Scott said.
“They pushed eventual grand finalists Port Macquarie. We were up 4-1 but went down 5-4.
“At 11 years of age, they showed they were more than competitive. We are very excited about this age group.”
“We had a rocky start with a couple players pulling out which was out of our control,” 13s girls B coach Hanah Little said.
“We got two girls off the pick-up list who were both underage, one was nine and only two in our team were top age. The girls were capable and accomplished so much. Unfortunately we fell short. They progressed so much over the week.”
TAMWORTH RESULTS
Boys Division 1
Tamworth lost to North West Sydney 4-2
Tamworth lost to Illawarra South Coast 4-1
Tamworth drew with Parkes 1-1
Tamworth lost to Central Coast 2-1
Tamworth defeated Grafton 5-1
Boys Division 3
Tamworth lost to Goulburn 7-1
Tamworth lost to Northern Sydney & Beaches 12-0
Tamworth lost to Port Macquarie Hastings 5-4
Tamworth lost to Port Macquarie Hastings 4-0
Tamworth defeated Orange 4-0
Girls Division 1
Tamworth lost to Northern Sydney & Beaches 2-1
Tamworth defeated North West Sydney 2-0
Tamworth lost to Goulburn 5-1
Tamworth lost to Metro South West 2-0
Tamworth drew with New England 0-0
Girls Division 2
Tamworth lost to Orange 8-0
Tamworth lost to Grafton 5-0
Tamworth lost to Sydney South 4-0
Tamworth drew with Dubbo 0-0
Tamworth lost to North West Sydney 3-1
GRAND FINAL RESULTS
GIRLS
Division one: Goulburn 4 d Central Coast 2
Division two: Port Macquarie-Hastings 3 d Orange 1
Division three: Goulburn 1 d Sydney East 0
BOYS
Division one: Illawarra-South Coast 7 d Newcastle 0
Division two: Manning Valley 6 d Illawarra-South Coast 4
Division three: Bathurst 5 d Port Macquarie-Hastings 2