By RICHARD PHILIP
CASUARINA have played one of their best games of the season to win their all-Tweed Coast clash in the Tweed Women’s Hockey competition at Murwillumbah’s Barrie Smith Hockey Field at the weekend.
The Casuarina side was on fire, defeating Kingscliff 5-0 with Allie Farrell and Kim Tuckwell both scroring twice and one goal to Hannah Raftery.
Kingscliff has hardly dropped a game all year but is starting to falter at the business end of the season while Casuarina is going from strength-to-strength and could end up being the team to beat come finals time.
The other women’s match saw Murwillumbah and Waratahs play out a 0-0 draw, with Bobbie Philip being player of the match for Waratahs, while Murwillumbah was best-served by keeper Erin Fleeton and Brodie Palmer.
Murwillumbah is really showing it is a very good hockey team and has one of the best defences in the competition hence opposing teams are finding it very hard to score and win.
The Hardcourt Men’s Hockey League also saw a close result and a one-sided affair on Friday night in Murwillumbah.
Central Comets defeated an under-strength East Coast Sharks 6-1 in the opening game of the night.
The Sharks’ keeper went down sick before the game, forcing them to play without anyone in goals. It was a move that looked to be working early on with the Sharks controlling the ball and even scoring first. But that was to be their last goal of the match with Comets seizing control and mounting continuous attacking raids.
The following game between the Waratahs and Kingscliff saw the first draw of the season in the Hardcourt competition. It was the first time the new extra-time rule had been used. The rule sees a penalty shoot-out with a player taking on the goalkeeper from 25 metres out.
Every one was poised for this exciting ending but it failed to deliver as Waratah’s Tim Willis easily evaded the Kingy keeper and then the Kingy striker got himself tangled up and missed his shot, giving the points to the Burringbar team.
Speaking to the players from both teams after the game, they were happy with a draw and disliked this new rule.
The game should have been all over by half time as Kingscliff went to the break 2-0 up, clearly dominating the play. They could have been leading by as much as 5-0 by the break if they had taken their chances, but the Waratahs fought their way back into the game with three unanswered goals in the second half before Kingscliff snared the equliser just before full time.
If Kingscliff are to be a force in this comp they need to be ruthless and must take these easy opportunities to win and stamp their authority over teams, not just cruise around and let teams back into the game.
Next week’s games will see all first grade men and women play on Saturday afternoon with the men’s Hardcourt hockey league games first up with Waratahs playing the East Coast Sharks at 12.45pm, then following at 2.10pm it’s the match of the round – equal second-placed Kingscliff and Central Comets, then the women with Casurina against Waratahs at 3.35pm and the last game at 5pm is Murwillumbah and Kingscliff.
So, with comps so close and all games played at the same venue on the same day it should be a great afternoon to come and watch some very fast, entertaining hockey.
