Senior Boys' Hockey News 

1st XI v Ardvreck

click here for the season's statistics so far

Result

Belhaven	4		Goal Scorers:	Tom Stodart	3
Ardvreck	0			Douglas Donaldson	1

 

The hockey season - cold, windy, exposed pitches! I take my hat off (not literally on Wednesday as it was pretty parky!) to the spectators who hung around to watch the first match of the season and to the players who had come down early to support the victorious Seconds. Their hands grew numb and their knees turned blue, but when their turn arrived they put all cold thoughts away and produced some hot hockey.

Captain Archie Rettie won the toss and gave Ardvreck possession - in retrospect a very wise decision as an early error from Ardveck gifted Belhaven the ball and from that moment the Belhaven half line put together good linking moves.

Much use was made of Andrew Watson on the right wing and he grew in stature as the game progressed. Sloughing off last year's reticence in attacking the defence players, Andrew took them on and more often than not got through, either winning penalty corners or producing good passes for the strikers.

George Cuthbert commanded the centre pretty well for his first go in that position. He linked well with Douglas Donaldson, who had decided that he wanted a go at being a half rather than a back as in last season, and both fed Andrew plenty of opportunities.

Forcing the ball to switch across the field proved troublesome. None of the halves saw the wider game and were a little too blinkered, but it's early days. Freddy Rogers and Henry Roberts, on the left of the field, became busier as the match went on and both showed a lot of promise - skillful, determined and quick.

The two strikers, Caspar 'getanewstick' Rogers and Tom Stodart were quick to pounce on the ball when it was passed through and although neither has devastating shooting power they have nippiness and guile. Positioning sense was good and Tom's 3 goals were scored by good changes of angle.

Any attacks that Ardvreck made were dealt with sumamrily by the back trio, Leo Seymour, Archie Rettie and Ali Johnston. All three showed sound tackling technique but it was Archie who dominated the defense. Ardvreck found it very hard to penetrate and sadly (from the Goal Coach's perspective) Olly Farr did not need to use his armour! Olly may well have been relieved but it would have been a good practice had he been needed to save a few shots. Credit, then, to the defence!

A 3 - 0 lead at half time could have given the Belhaven team a sense of complacency, but there was no way they were going to let their game slip. Ardvreck upped theirs, though, and many more attacks managed to get through the halves  as their legs became tired. Gaps opened up and the chase back was not as evident as in the first half - just have to get fitter!

George Innes Ker came on and played as left half very effectively and showed good skill and awareness. What was very pleasing to see throughout the match were the patterns of play that the boys showed. Good interchanging, different angles of passing and support play. What is needed now is for there to be more awareness of what is going on in other parts of the pitch.

There was often huge amounts of space on the left, especially in the second half, and it was not until a frustrated Coach/Umpire suggested the pivot switch that things began to improve to give Henry and George some possession.

Credit must go to the Ardvreck keeper who made a number of excellent saves to keep the score down. But in the end the better side won convincingly. However, no swelling heads must be seen as there is lots of work to be done to hone those stick skills and develop more patterns of play. It looks to be shaping up to be an interesting season - here's to slightly warmer weather for both practice and matches.

Well done all for a good entertaining afternoon's hockey. See you back on the training ground on Monday!

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