WA Over 50's - 2012 Match Reports

WA vs VIC - Monday, October 1, 2012

And so it began, 
Two teams of elite chiselled warriors strode onto a pitch bathed in bright Hobart sunshine (no really) in just 70 something minutes someone's dreams would be shattered. Would it be the proud Victorians with their under-age captain? Or the lightly seasoned black ducks? 

With our coaches strong words of encouragement still ringing in our ears, we took the pitch. 

Now if I remember correctly they passed to someone then we passed to someone, then they trapped and we trapped , then Norm touched the ball then we were one goal up. Then the final whistle went. 

Good had triumphed over evil 

Match report by kelpie 

Result: WA 1 – VIC 0 

Goal scorers: Norm Morrison 
Best player as voted by WA and VIC: Paul Scicluna (goz) 
Cards: Yellow – nil. Green – nil.

WA vs WAC - Tuesday, October 2, 2012 

Hockey? A game? Fun? No this was none of those things, it was old slow guys chasing other old slow guys for bragging rights! 

As the yet undefeated WA metro team strode manfully on to the pitch, we watched our country cousins slink from their subterranean lair, blinking as the last vestiges of the days light hit their untrained eyes, we noted with some amusement their feeble attempt at a pre game warm up. Too late to learn to play the game now we thought. 

Well what that was a mistake, at almost the exact moment the umpires caressed their whistles in to life, so did a metamorphosis occur, yes our country cousins were bloody good players! 

But brilliant skills and incredible fitness can only take you so far; we had a plan! 
Yes my friends a plan, our fearless and gifted coaching staff had burnt the midnight oil and reinvented the wheel, only this one was square! 

Needless to say it didn't work and we spent the entire first half chasing, but our coaches didn't waste their considerable talents just watching us do circle work, they hatched yet another lavae of brilliance! 

The half time coaching address took on almost biblical proportions, as Cam (our own version of Moses) stated the obvious 
"well that didn't f......... Work did it! You lot probably need to do something a little less complicated". 
And so it was done; Mala went back to tackling like a man possessed, Trotty stood tall in defence, Razor continued to give his opponents nightmares and Jimmy did what Jimmy does, scored the wining goal! 

There is a lesson in this for all who play this glorious game. It is not what the players do on the field that matters, it is what strange men do at night alone with their white boards that matters! 

Result: WA 1 – WAC 0 

Goal scorers: Jimmy Miller 
Best player as voted by WA: Razor Embry 
Best player as voted by WAC: Doc Carville

WA vs TAS - Wednesday, October 3, 2012 

After each of the previous two games I have excitedly approached the task of sharing our glorious victories. Today it is to be a different story. 
Oh yes there were great highs and yes some soul destroying lows, but as they say the measure of a man/team is not how many times they fall but how many times they get back up! 
Well in the case of this game the count was 6 falls to 3 get ups ! 
Not great, but any team that can play as badly as we did (your scribe was one of the worst sinners) and only lose 3 to 2 can't be all bad. That being said there are certain parts of the game that need to be both highlighted and glossed over. 
Big bunny was at his aggressive best, Ousty was running around like a semi startled gazelle, Spike was carving a swathe along the wing. 
And here is the big one, CAM outran one of the Tasmanian fullbacks in a flat out sprint; I repeat CAM outran one of the Tassie fullbacks in a flat out sprint!!! 
To those of us who know the little fella, this has been a long time in the remaking!!! 
And before the nasty amongst you ask, no unusual seismic readings were recorded! (Really some people). 
Just one last thing and this might lead to your scribe having a sudden unforeseen accident (read cement shoes) maybe, just maybe the coaches may or may not have told us, to how do I say 'take a dive'? 

Result: WA 2 – TAS 3 

Goal scorers: Shaun Bunn and Jimmy Miller 
Best player as voted by WA : Jimmy Miller 
Best player as voted by TAS: Shaun Bunn 

Match report by "the kelpie"

WA vs QLD - Friday, October 5, 2012 

What a difference a day makes! 

As the weak Hobart sunshine fought to crack the ice covering the field two teams of brave players strode manfully to the middle ready to give their all in the pursuit of glory! 
Luckily we were on the next field huddled around a small one bar radiator bitching about fixturing and man's inhumanity to man. 
But I digress, on to the game at hand, poetry, rythm, synchronism and a lot of other strange and difficult to spell words come to mind, but none of them could be used to even attempt to describe the veritable feast that was presented for any hockey aficionado that wandered past pitch two. 

The huge crowd was at times breathing, sighing, willing, dreading and regretting all simultaneously. 
Yes my fearless friends, quality hockey had returned to Hobart!! And that was only the first ten minutes. 

In the interest of for filling the somewhat maudlin interest of some for detail regarding what actually happened on the field I offer the following. 
Jimmy got the ball quite often and resisted the long held convention of either trapping or finishing. The rest of the team embraced our spiritual leader's new and somewhat different approach and proceeded to emulate Jimmy to the best of our ability, but unfortunately Noel who has only just flown in from across the pond refused to be a team player and slotted a goal (he was subbed and dressed down immediately). 

Unfortunately this lack of discipline infiltrated the entire team and yes my friends you can guess what happened then, everyone wanted to shoot, everyone suddenly started to trap. 
If it had not been for Cam's fearless leadership and ability to stop this Tom-foolery by putting his foot down (ok it was on the goal line - attacking end) ( would have been Jimmy' s goal). 
Sorry I should also mention that while we were doing this Queensland seemed to be having fun playing with coloured Lego bricks in the corner of the field (nice work boys). 

Result: WA 2 – QLD 1 

Goal scorers: Noel Morrison and Jimmy Miller 
Best player as voted by WA and QLD: Noel Morrison 

Match report by "the kelpie" 

WA vs NSW - Saturday, October 6, 2012 

Three words, Three short beautiful words! 

Noel Morrison! 

Yes it is all encapsulated in those the sweetest of words. 

How much can one man give, for him everything is not enough! 

I feel I probably need in some small to way explain the somewhat sycophantic reference above, for those of you unlucky enough not to see the hockey clinic Noel put on last night. You should have been there is all I can say! 

Three goals in under 7.21 min. 

Impressed? 

Well we were! 

Until we realised that was it! You see Noel apparently is unaware that a hockey game goes for a bit longer than 7.21min, I mean subbing off to get a soy latte, may not seem wrong to some but ....well! 
However one of the joys of hockey is that it takes a lot more than one man to make a team, so it was time for us to step up as a team and show what we were made of ! 

As it turns out, not a lot! 

No not true, NSW awoke from their nightmare and we spent the rest of the game trying desperately to protect our lead; they threw everything at us. 
I think it is important to point out a couple of stand out performances. Pugs the quiet achiever delivered his best game so far in the tournament; Gnome's contribution could not be ignored, Doc led from the front at the back, you know what I mean; Jenno ran the bench with ruthless efficiency. 
And by the time Noel returned with his cup of froth we were able to point to the full time score of 3 to us 2 to them. 

To the best of my knowledge this is the first time in sevenish years WA 50's have beaten NSW. 

Equal top of the table!!!! 

Result: WA 3 – NSW 2 

Goal scorers: Noel Morrison (3) 
Best player as voted by WA : Doc 
Best player as voted by NSW: Goz 
Cards: Yellow – nil. Green – nil.

WA vs VIC - Monday, October 8, 2012 

After every game I am charged with the rather onerous task of recalling the game in almost photographic detail, yes I have been told that reading my reports are just like being there. 

Well this game is a particularly difficult one to reconstruct or in fact deconstruct; you see in each of our previous games something interesting happened! However this game was dull and uninteresting; I think the umpire summed it up superbly at the 17 minute mark in the first half when he suggested it might have been better if we had invited the whole Victorian team to play. 
For once I am tempted to err on the side of brevity, but one has been told on many occasions not give in to temptation. 
I feel that Cam attempting to establish a claim for land rights by not once, but twice sitting on the under age Victorian captain does need to be mentioned. 
The lack of contribution by the on field Victorians was summed up by the fact that we awarded best player to their mascot, a seeing eye dog named Ralph. 

Final score 1 nil to the good guys. Spike insisted that I name the goal scorers and our ladder position 

Report by 'The Kelpie' 

Result: WA 1 – VIC 0 

Goal scorers: Jimmy Miller 
Best player as voted by WA : Trottie 
Best player as voted by VIC: Jimmy

WA vs WAC - Wednesday, October 10, 2012 

Habit forming! 

Remember when you were told stop doing that or you'll go blind? 

Well I hope you you did, blind hockey will never catch on. 

Anyway enough of that, on to the match report, think chiselled warriors, think elite athletes, think penguins, all three have the same relevance to this game, Nothing ! 

As our eloquent coaching staff pointed out in their usual sugar coated way, our first half reminded them of their time spent herding disinterested learning-impaired sheep; apparently this was not what was required to win the game (in their eyes). 

So after much soul searching, gnashing of teeth and multiple red snakes, we took to the field. 
What a difference, in the debacle that was the first half we had only managed to score one lone goal. But with our new and improved structure, increased awareness, and a much higher level of opponent responsibility, we managed to hold on for a one nil win. 
Again let me point out it is not players that win matches, but slightly strange white board obsessed coaches that make he difference. 

Report by 'The Kelpie' 

Result: WA n – WAC n 

Goal scorers: Jimmy Miller 
Best player as voted by WA : Kelpie 
Best player as voted by WAC: Rusty 
Cards: Yellow – nil. Green – nil.

Semi-Final WA vs WAC - Friday, October 12, 2012 

Remember the expression everyone's a winner? For gods sake don't tell WAC! 

Three times they turned up to play us and three times they walked away like whipped puppies (please, no dogs were hurt in the writing of this report). 
It would only sound arrogant if I waxed lyrical about our tight marking, silky passes and our glorious finishing. 
So I shan't, wouldn't have been true anyway. 
You see there is a truth about our team that I have hidden in my many match reports and in the interest of accuracy I shall elaborate. 
We are not silky, we are not particularly good at finishing and above all we don't have a single hero player, you see we are a team, the most frightening of all opponents. 

So it is with a light heart that I warn TASSIE, you may have a group of axe wielding lumberjacks and mountain men, but we have a team. 

Bring on tomorrow. 

Result: WA 1 – WAC 0 

Goal scorers: Ray Embry 

Final WA vs TAS - Saturday, October 8, 2012 

Filled with hope our chests bursting with pride and anticipation we sat waiting in the change rooms. 

Listening intently to our coaches pregame strategy “tag their best player” “Protect the spine” “short accurate passing” “Time with the ball” the pearls of wisdom were dropping so fast it was almost impossible to catch them all, but catch them we did. 

Finally the game before ours reached its conclusion, we rushed out congratulate the WA 55’s on their glorious win, only to be told that they the most unbackable of favourites’ had had their hopes dashed and had lost 2 goals to nil. 

Self doubt started to infiltrate our collective psyche, if they couldn’t, how could we! I mean they were the 55’s and we were only the 50’s. 

We took the field (we will give it back soon) and started our most intense and focused warm-up, drill after drill, sprints, goal shots, passing and of course more one on one strategising. 

At the other end the TAS’y log choppers sharpened their axes and talked of their childhoods growing up in the deep woods. 

Then the game started we were everywhere they were everywhere else, they scored! Ha one goal, it doesn’t matter we will have that equaliser in just a moment! We were all over them, shot after shot went wide, high, over, under and anywhere else but in! 

The gods of hockey were toying with us!  

End result a 1 nil loss 

Blame : squarely at the feet of the 55’s they burst the bubble!  

Result: WA 0 – TAS 1