Indoor hockey’s finals night

Press, 7 May 1980, Page 24

Indoor hockey’s finals night

By

KEVIN TUTTY

The indoor hockey finals night inevitably produces exciting matches and this evening’s finals at Canterbury Court will be fiercely fought. Two of the defending champions — Carlton in the women’s division I final, and Christchurch Boys’ High School in the secondary schools’ division I final — will be stretched to win their sixth successive titles. The two teams have had a stranglehold on the divisions since their introduction in 1975.

There is little to choose between Carlton and the other finalist, Bumside. In their section match earlier in the season they drew 4-all, and the final tonight will be as tight. Last year, Carlton beat Burnside 3-2 in the final. Carlton’s trio of New Zealand representatives, Lesley Shankland, Shirley Haig and Pat Barwick, have been in sparkling form in the last couple of weeks and will play a major role if Carlton succeeds again. Burnside’s New Zealand representative, Judith Phillips, is extremely dangerous on attack, but will need strong support from players like Jane Earnshaw, Mary Allan and Julia Allan. Papanui High School has the same team that played in last year’s final against Christchurch Boys’ High School. It was favoured to win a year ago, but nerves got the better of it on finals night and C.B.H.S. won, 5-1. This year Papanui is a year more experienced, and has coasted through to the final. It has conceeded only seven goals in as many games and scored 55. In section play, it beat C.B.H.S. 3-0. A cheer team which Pa-

panui hopes to have at the finals should help to overcome any nervousness this year. University is seeking its eighth successive title in the men’s first division. Its opponent, Selwyn-Hill-morton, which forced University to extra time two years ago, has a well-bal-anced team but lacks the experience of University.

Mark Burt and George Carnoutsos will provide attacking power equal to that of University’s, but whether Robin Wilson, Phillip Agent and

Craig Burt can contain the University attack, including John Christensen, Barry and Chris Maister, Warwick Shillito and Neil Edmundson, is doubtful. Selwyn Maister said University had not played well this year and that Selwyn would not be easy to beat. But that cautious statement was probably triggered by the memory of the 8-7 win in extra time in 1978. Selwyn had a stronger defence that year.