Win To Canterbury In Women’s Hockey

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31725, 8 July 1968, Page 12

Win To Canterbury In Women’s Hockey

Although it won comfortably, 3-0, the Canterbury women’s hockey team was not particularly impressive against Malvern. The game was generally scrappy and there was much aimless hitting on both sides.

However, Canterbury showed sufficient flashes of ability to indicate that it should mould into a formidable combination. Canterbury’s major faults were the slowness of the forwards to retreat to link with the defence, a tendency to rush tackles, and too much hard, aimless hitting which resulted in loss of possession. Such was Canterbury’s territorial superiority that B. Makinson had an easy afternoon in goal. M. Bruhns was the better back because her tackling and trapping were generally sound, but she had a tendency to dribble with the ball and her clearances were too often directed to the Malvern backs. J. Capstick was disappointing, her form being below that of her club games. Half-Back Mixture The half-line was a mixture of good and bad. S. Comer, at centre-half, was the outstanding player. Her positional play was always sound, her tackling well-timed and her passes, though often delivered under pressure, accurate. A. Rouse, at left-half, marked her wing effectively, and her passing generally was accurate. However, she, and A. McKenna, the right-half, too often were caught with the ball on their wrong side and were thus guilty of unnecessary obstruction. The forwards combined effectively but poor trapping and some extremely poor passing, nullified many of their efforts. M. Bennett, making her debut on the right-wing, made some strong runs late in the game and her centring was welltimed. She made little effort, however, to elude her marker, L. Rutledge, at right-inner, made som devastating breaks at times, but at others delayed her passes far too long. J. Dann was closely marked In the centre. H. Walker was the best of the forwards, trapping well and switching play to the right flank with good effect. D Eddy suffered from a poor supply of ball, but her trapping was not always reliable. The Canterbury forwards were dangerous in the circle and it was only a brilliant display of goal-keeping by R. Prouting that kept the scoring down. Often she was left to cope singlehanded with the Canterbury attack and her blocking and clearing under such conditions was outstanding. M. Colee, at right-back, tackled resolutely for Malvern, but she and her partner, D. McCartney, were guilty of much hard and aimless hitting which often transferred possession to Canterbury. J. Watson, at left-half, was the best of the halves, tackling well

and passing constructively. With J. Ell and M. Harcourt, she was able to make a number of interceptions when the Canterbury forwards failed to link quickly enough with their defence. The Malvern forwards were lively and hard-working, but suffered from an erratic supply of ball from their defence. C. Hulston, A. Wright and A. Bush backtackled assiduously and D. Rowlands, on the leftwing, made several breaks which foundered on Canterbury's deep defence. Canterbury’s goals were scored by D. Eddy, M. Bennett and J. Dann. Other results were: Canterbury B 6 (G. Philips 3, A. Howman 2 and A. Baylis), Malvern 1 (E. Green). Primary School Grade.—Malvern A 4, Canterbury A 1; Canterbury B 2, Malvern B 0.