Hockey captain delivers milk to get fit for Moscow

Press, 12 April 1980, Page 17

Hockey captain delivers milk to get fit for Moscow

By

KEVIN TUTTY

Maungakaramea and Outram are small farming communities at opposite ends of New Zealand — the types of town you would miss if you sneezed while passing through. But they have one thing in common. Between them the settlements have been home to Jenny McDonald, the New Zealand women’s hockey captain, for most of her 30 years. It was at Maungakaramea, 19km southwest of Whangarei, that Jenny Bint learned the highlv technical skills of hockey, skills that have made her one of the world’s most brilliant woman players. For the last nine years Outram has been her home. A few weeks after she represented New Zealand for the first time at the international tournament’ in Auckland in 1971, Jenny married Rex McDonald and moved to Outram. Since then she has become an instantly • recognisable figure in the settlement. She is the primary school teacher and each evening she jogs about the town delivering the milk on her husband’s round. “It gets me out at nights when it’s wet and cold and helps keep me in trim during the summer. But it is only a small part of the training I do for the winter season, or an overseas tour,” she said.

In the nine years since 1971 Mrs McDonald has constructed an enviable record, and as far as she is concerned there is no end to it in sight.

When asked if the tour to the Moscow Olympics would be her finale, her “no” was quite definite. “I haven’t considered retiring yet. I feel that as long. as I am. able to play at international level I will.”

By the time the Olympics start Mrs McDonald

will be 31, but her dedication to fitness and skill are such that she could conceivably be a member of the next Olympic team in 1984.

Mrs McDonald, and Pat Barwick, the person she succeeded as New Zealand captain when the Olympic team was announced, are the only survivors of the 1971 team. On the world championships tour to Vancouver last year both played their one hundredth game for New Zealand. Accurate records have not been

kept of the number of internationals the pair has played but it would be in the fifties. Mrs McDonald has not kept a record of the number of goals she has scored for New Zealand, either, but she said different people who have closely followed the fortunes of the team put the figure at between half and two-thirds of the goals New Zealand has scored in the time Mrs McDonald has been playing. “I have been lucky, though. As well as being a forward I have taken penalty corners and penalty strokes which has given me more opportunities to score than I would normally get.” Last year at the tournament in Vancouver New Zealand beat a hapless Fijian side, 12-1, and Mrs McDonald’s personal tally was seven, the most she has scored in an international, and possibly a world record for an international.

But that game was an exception. In recent years defences in international women’s;, games have become much tighter and goals harder to get, she said.

In her early years, playing hockey to Mrs McDonald was as natural as growing up. She was the second youngest of five children, and the Bint family had a strong hockey heritage. Her father was the Whangarei selector-coach for 16 years. In that time the provincial team progressed from minor to major association status (it requires more than 300 Open graded players to become a major association). The culmination of the 16 years for Mr Bint was

Whangarei’s win against Canterbury in the Challenge Shield final in 1968.

Mrs McDonald has an elder brother who umpired at the national men’s tournament in Blenheim last year, and this year her younger brother is a member Of the Northland colts team, and a candidate for the New Zealand junior team to tour Australia in July.

“Sport plays a large part in your life when you live in a country area,” said Mrs McDonald. When she left school she went to training college in Auckland and played for the province immediately. It was an indication of her talent that she was able to win a place in one of the strongest teams in the country in her first year in Auckland. “When we first arrived at Outram, I think there were only the two of us who knew anything about hockey. The first time I went on an overseas tour I don’t think many people, knew I had gone.”

But Mrs McDonald has changed that. Her enthusiasm for the game has led to it being played at the primary school, and her influence has spread

even further. She has become a vital part of Otago women’s hockey.

She is a regional coach, a job which involves holding clinics for other coaches throughout the Otago and Southland districts. Recently she was involved in a week-end tutoring coaches from all parts of the two provinces.

For the last two seasons she has coached the Otago tmder-21 team in the national inter-provincial competition. It was no coincidence that in both

years Otago won.. Both years it beat a potentially stronger Canterbury team.

In 1976 she coached the Otago senior team to win the K Cup at the national women’s tournament, and has guided the Otago team in the three years since. In addition, she coaches her club team. Taieri, and is a member of the Otago Women’s Hockey Association’s executive. “That way I know what’s going on at provincial level.” This year, though, the coaching and selecting duties have been dispensed with. “The Olympics are something you might only get the chance to compete in once. It is the premier sporting competition in the world and to be fair to myself and the rest of the team I have got to put all my time into preparing for Moscow.”

It was a complete surprise to Mrs 'McDonald when she was named captain of the Olympic team.On the previous two overseas tours she was vicecaptain to Mrs Barwick, who had been captain of the side since the Auckland tournament in 1971.

“My appointment must have detracted from some of Pat’s confidence. But it

hasn’t altered a strong friendship we have built up over nine years, and I know she will play just as well and give me any support I need.”

She is confident the team can do well in Moscow. Ross Gillespie, the coach of the men’s team that won the gold medal four years ago in Montreal, told the women during their training clinic at Lincoln College last weekend that he believed their team is at the same stage the men were four years ago. They have a good blend of experience and youth.

Mrs McDonald considers the main threat to New Zealand is the Netherlands. “They are always hard to beat" It is difficult to handle their close marking and their attackers are fast and use space so well. The West Germans we don’t' worry about- to the same extent. We have usually been able to handle them.” In the last few years there has been a dramatic change in styles and attitudes in international hockey. The approach of overseas teams is completely professional now, said Mrs McDonald, and New Zealand is lagging.

“Our team consists entirely of working girls. We don’t get paid to go and train in camps for months at a time like the overseas teams. It’s going to get harder for us to keep pace. “Our club players never see the national side playing, so they don’t get the chance to see what standards are required to reach the top these days.And in the last few-years the .national, team has been away at the' time of the national tournament, so provincial players . don’t get the opportunity to play against .the New Zealand players.” ■