The Hockey Victoria Junior State Championships were held the first week of the school holidays, with 56 teams from around the state competing for title of State Champion in the under 13, under 15 and under 17 age group.
The Southern Metro Sharks, the region covering from Brighton, to Berwick and to Mornington had 6 teams, with a team in each age group. Fifty players from Southern United were selected in these six teams and played their heart out for the week. While Sharks did not come home as state champions this year, the results were impressive.
The under 13 girls, with Southern United Julian Pratt as head coach, and Dominique Blatherwick, Emily Butler, Ile De Vos, Emilia Downes, Shayla Jansz, Hayley Lambert, Josie Lawton, Taylor Nel, Molly O’Neill, Evie Stansby in the team played a great tournament to make it to the gold medal match against the North East Country Knights. The game was tight finishing 1 all, and coming down to the tight and nerve wracking penalty shoot out in which Knights took the honours.
The under 15 boys with Southern United players Tom Curtis, Jonathan D’Rozario, Billy Hanrahan, Ted Harvey, Sam Letts, Craig Marais, Rylan Pease, Trent Symss, Christian van der Merwe, Mees van Lammeren, Carlin Walker also had a strong tournament. The gold medal match against the North West Metro tigers, was also a tight game with Tigers taking the gold 1-0.
The under 17 girls with Samantha Chew, Rechelle Lester, Arielle Vandewerdt-Holman also played North East Country knights in the gold medal match, where the strong country girls proved too much, giving the Sharks girls the silver medal.
The under 15 girls were unlucky. After a slow start to the tournament they finished strong, missing out on the gold medal match, not on points, not on goal difference, but on goals for. This left them playing for bronze on the Friday where they easily dispatched the Western Metro Wildcats 2-1.
The under 13 boys were lucky to have Southern’s Premier League goalie Ed Arnold as coach and Under 12 mixed shield team manager, as team manager. The team with Will Carruthers, Jacques Carstens, Dominic Eddy, Ferdinand Eichhorn, Edward Fitzgerald, Nicholas Fitzgerald, Tyler Jacobs, Aiden Mosford, Lachlan Paice, Anthony Papadoplous, Davin Walker, Charlie Williams played a strong tournament, with the older stronger teams just proving too much. Despite that the boys worked well to make the State Netball and Hockey centre for finals day and played Central Flames in the bronze medal match, with Flames taking the bronze.
The under 17 boys did not have the tournament they would have liked. Felix Harvey, Hamish lambert, Pim Okhuizen, Ben Rogalsky, Sam Tickner represented Southern United and the team finished fifth.
