18 September 2007 By Verena Stocker
Sydney University’s Third Grade women’s hockey team broke a 100-year drought at the weekend when they became the first team in the club to win the minor and major premiership double in the Sydney Metro competition.
Having headed the competition ladder at the end of the season proper, the Thirds completed the task in the grand final at the weekend with a 6-4 win over Moorebank to take the title and set the standard for other grades.
In a closely fought tussle, Sydney University Sixth Grade also won their premiership, defeating minor premiers University of Technology, Sydney 1-0.
And Sydney University was assured of a premiership in Fifth Division with two teams contesting the grand final. Experience counted, with the women’s veterans’ team, the Sydney University Rollers, running out 3-1 winners.
Unfortunately the men’s teams had less success, with no team making the semi-finals. The best placed men’s team was Fifth Grade, who finished fifth and were unlucky to miss the semi-finals. Their season ended on a “might-have-been’ note - one more goal would have elevated them to fourth position and into the play-offs.
“We felt like we had a real chance this year, but where we let ourselves down was consistency - we drew some matches we should have won, and lost a couple we shouldn't have,” says player David Warton.
Both the First and Second grades failed to make an impression in the competition, finishing 11th and 10th respectively. First Grade coach Bill Greenless described the disappointment of realising that they did not have adequate good players to defeat the strongest teams.
“The bottom line is we could not convert circle penetrations into goals or corners and conceded 2-3 soft goals on average in defence every match,” he said.
After winning the first three of five games to sit in the top four, Second Grade also struggled as the season went on and finished 11th.