2021 Open Indoor Club Championships Review

2021 Open Indoor Club Championships Review

It was incredibly exciting to see Indoor Hockey return over the weekend, with the Open Men’s & Women’s Indoor Club Championships taking place.

We had with 12 Men’s teams and 8 Women’s teams with over 150 players participating and from an officiating perspective it was wonderful to see over 30 officials return to Hockey.

There was no shortage of goals, with a grand total of 350 scored for the weekend. In the Women’s Competition it was Altona’s Jessie Brennan that toped the table with 12 goals and in the Men’s, it was Oliver Marshall from TEM that led the scoring with 11 goals.

In the Women’s Competition, it was Hawthorn and Mentone that met in the Grand Final and it was a thriller. Hawthorn took the ascendency early with first half goals to Emily Hurtz and Sophie Thompson. But Mentone fought back with goals to Takara Haines and Teisha King to level the scores at 2-2. With only two minutes, we looked like we were headed for shootouts, but a last-minute penalty corner goal to Takara Haines sealed the victory 3-2 to Mentone. Congratulations to Mentone Hockey Club on claiming the Gold Medal and also to Hawthorn Hockey Club for claiming the Silver Medal.

In the Men’s Competition, we had two undefeated teams in Altona and Waverley meeting in the Gold Medal Match. It was another thriller, going right down to the wire! Waverley were fast out of the blocks and lead 2-0 through some fantastic play that led to goals to Stephen Head and Sam Poppenbeek. Altona kept pushing and were able to get the score to 2-1 through a Heath McDonald goal, but Waverley held on by a thread to take the victory 2-1. Congratulations to Waverley Hockey Club on winning the Gold Medal and to Altona on claiming the Silver Medal.

Congratulations to Millie Castor and Iris Milham on their appointments to the Women’s Gold Medal Matches, and Ged Grimwade and Cam Rutley on their appointments to the Men’s Gold Medal Matches. A huge thank you also must go to all the other Umpires that officiated across the weekend, as well as the Technical Officials, the Event clearly would not be possible without you.

A huge thank you to our Umpire Manager Steve McDonald, Assistant Umpire Manager Jeremy Harris and Umpire Coaches Sam Cutrale, Cameron Rutley and Ged Grimwade for their tireless work across the weekend.

Our Tournament Directors, Lynette Delaney and Chris Graven were instrumental in ensuring that the Event not only ran smoothly, but took place in a COVIDSafe manners, so we cannot thank them enough for their time and dedication.

Finally, a big thank you to Monash University, MSAC and all the teams that participated in the Event. It truly was fantastic to have Indoor Hockey back!

If you missed the action on the weekend, you can check out all the results by clicking here. Thank you to Stuart Westmore for providing some incredible images from the weekend which are available on the HV Facebook page, as well as a replay of the two Gold Medal Matches.

Don’t forget, the Indoor action continues this weekend with the Under 13 Boys & Girls taking to the court at Monash University. Be sure to check out our Indoor Club Championships Facebook Event for updates!