Sils cruise closer to Championship

The Sils travelled to Streetly on a very pleasant Saturday - making a refreshing change from previous weeks.

In reality, this was as comfortable a victory as the Sils will have all season, though their first half performance left plenty of room for improvement. They started brightly with good work from James Clapham and Chris Ready down the right, enabling Jamie Glynn to be picked out on the top of the D, and the home keeper was definitely not expecting Glynn to instantly turn and rifle a reverse stick shot into the bottom corner. A few minutes later, and it was 2-0; Glynn again the scorer, but this time with almost the exact opposite of finishes, deftly deflecting the ball over the keeper from a Conor Jones snapshot. At this point, the Copt Heath side took their gas off the pedal a little, and turned over the ball a little too easily meaning they did not add further to their lead.

With the second half starting, the third goal was always going to be crucial, as if Streetly had scored, they would have had a sniff of a very unlikely victory. However, 5 minutes in, and it was Glynn's turn to be provider with a clever turn and pass across the D, for Andre Tchakhotine to arrive perfectly on time to notch the first of his three goals.

With the Sils upping the pressure, they won a series of penalty corners, and with Streetly all set up to focus on the double drag-flick threat from Dan Sulway and Glynn, the Sils cleverly mixed up their routines to first allow James Clapham to score from close range, and then for Glynn to complete his hat-trick by thundering home a straight strike into the bottom corner. 15 minutes to go and shortly after Streetly had scored their consolation goal off the back of a defensive mistake, it was time for Tchakhotine to complete his hat-trick. The second of his 3 goals, and the team's 6th, came from another left-wing move which resulted in him arriving perfectly at the far post again to score, and then his third initially came from some flowing hockey that put him in space in the D, but after it looked like he had initially missed his opportunity, he then robbed the ball back off the covering defender and fired home from close range.

A comfortable 7-1 away victory now means that a win on Saturday, when the side play at home with a 2pm start, will mean the Sils are Divisional Champions with 4 games to spare.