U14 Boys Progressing!

On Sunday 25th March the Old Sils U14 Boys squad (featuring a number of excellent Stratford ‘guest’ players) faced teams from Northampton and Hampton-in-Arden in the fifth round-robin stages of the EHL U14 Boys Development League. Due to some late Old Sils withdrawals, we were extremely fortunate that Susie, Sally and Janice (our loyal Stratford Mums) were able to co-opt two boys who had just finished runners-up for Stratford in the U10s tournament on the adjoining pitch! This enabled us to put Ollie Williams (who manfully volunteered!) in goal and play with the full complement of outfield players. So how did they do?

Pretty well actually! In the first match they beat Northampton 3-2; a team which had comprehensively defeated them earlier on in the season. This meant that Sils would maintain their mid-table position in their respective league. In the second match they faced a fearsomely strong team that has curiously opted to play in the EHL 3rd tier, as opposed to the two other upper tiers; Hampton-in-Arden. They have dominated this league this season, trouncing all who have faced them by prodigious margins, rarely conceding any goals! Our collective aim was to score against them – whatever the outcome! This we did within two minutes! We went on to score two more, but – inevitably perhaps (given the gap in age and experience) – the team was defeated. But not shamed by any means!

All those that represented Sils from both the home club and Stratford did a magnificent job. Ollie W (fantastic; brave first outing in goal THANKYOU!), Daniel N (drove down the right flank like a demon; scored a great individual goal running down the whole length of the pitch), Jamie (solid and aggressive in defence), Kheya B-B (intelligent, speedy, purposeful running at the opposition), Will (elusive and courageous), Piers (clever and combative), Ben S (skilful and nicely weighted ball distribution through the gaps), Matthew H (5 goals; deadly!)

Thanks to all the parents - our Stratford cousins for bailing us out at such short notice, Darren Hulbert for organising everything behind the scenes and Matt Ballentine-Brain for giving us the option of son #2! Thanks also to our Old Sils/Warwickshire Chairman, Steve Tabb, for refereeing on the day and organising a magnificent day of hockey at the new Solihull School hockey stadia!