An Update from Our President
Hello everyone,
Hope you’re all coping as well as you possibly can in these uncertain times.
Just wanted to give you a quick update on some highlights for the season thus far,
In June at our annual Queens Birthday tournament held in Pukekohe, both our men’s teams won their respective grades, and the Girls weren’t far off as well.
The Men’s A team kept us all riveted to the end, winning the Final in the penalty shoot-out against a very talented Pukekohe team. Remarkable goal keeping From Deelan Patel!
Earlier in July, our Youth teams (boys and girls) embarked on a week-long tour of Christchurch, A lot of planning and preparation had gone into the creation of this tour. Including a very successful fundraising evening, which was enjoyed by all who attended.
On the tour they played some talented opposition who were typical of Canterbury Hockey heritage, valuable experience was gained from the tour and some life time memories.
During the season our Junior D11 team Kesry had an afternoon tea generously hosted by our manager (Mala Patel) at her house. She invited her Uncle, Ramesh Patel, legendary Olympian to come along for a Q & A session. This turned out to be a fantastic opportunity for the Kids and Parents alike to engage and see his Olympic gold medal, everyone were so excited to see it and try it on. He also demonstrated his stick skills to the kids, a true magician with the ball!
I would like to highlight our woman’s teams success this season, they have gone unbeaten thus far, & scored over a hundred goals, and a couple against, most games they have not had a goalie either! A truly remarkable performance, they are currently awaiting their final game. Well done Girls!
We are currently awaiting on the latest updates from Hockey Auckland to see what the remainder of the season looks like for Seniors. Dependent on Government announcements around restriction levels, this will be updated to you all once comms are received.
We are in the process of updating our club shirts for the entire club, so hope to have this rolled out by next season.
Congratulations to Senior men, Prashant, Akshay and Keshan, who have been selected to represent the Auckland development side at the National tournament. Fantastic reward for your efforts!
We are still endeavoring to hold prize giving for the Juniors, Youth and Seniors as soon as we are in a lower alert level, we will update you all very shortly.
Auckland Hockey have secured the services of the Belguim Olympic winning coach, Shane Mcleod to run coaching sessions with Junior and Senior coaches later this year which will be very insightful and exciting. Will send updates once dates are confirmed.
We also have the AHA golf club day at Akarana Golf Club on the 18th October with Shane Mcleod running a Q&A session over the lunch break.
These spaces are now all allocated.
If you get a chance on Manoj Daji, CEO Of Auckland Hockey, has a podcast with Shane Mcleod, worth checking out! He references to two of our players. Watch it below.
Manoj also did a podcast with Ramesh Patel. A great insight into the path of our humble and national icon in Hockey NZ! Watch it below.
That’s it for now, please stay safe and look forward to seeing you all soon,
Regards,
Raj Pancha,
President