Hockey: Varsity battle lines drawn early

A miserable day befell Harlington, but a bright spirit dawned upon it - a historical rivalry that stretches back many a year. The result of this fixture would be a precursor to the sacred Varsity match.

We rocked up in luxury executive coaches that even had a fridge for B. Man Briggs’ pasta bake and associated refreshments. The scene was set for a medic bashing.

The game started abysmally for IC with lots of errors by the entire team except Dirty Whaler- our retention was worse than someone with diarrhoea. After a couple of short corners that went woefully wide off the hit of a certain C. Bell we piled the pressure on the medics. Half time arrived with the scores poised with neither team managing to break the deadlock.

After the break IC piled on the pressure. With some probing runs down the left courtesy of G-T-G, and a good set of searching wide balls by Y. Bag the medics’ circle was constantly under attack. It was only 20 minutes from the end when the medics were awarded a penalty corner which, despite some heroics from Goaltender, they poked it into the far post and were given the first goal of the game.

When the game restarted, IC were pinned in our half for around ten minutes - the medics’ aerial balls kept our centre backs pinned in our 23 metre area. It was only when we were awarded a short corner 5 minutes from time that the resurgence began. A mischievous shimmy from C. Bell led to a through ball to Goldemort who kept his composure and flicked it graciously over the helpless medics keeper’s body.

The remainder of the game was a tightrope walk by IC. A penetrating aerial from Dirty Whaler almost led to a much deserved second goal; alas it was not to be: thanks to the last ditch (and thankfully clean) tackles of Guill-I-Am and B. Man Briggs at centre back, we managed to keep it at 1-1.

Today’s performance bodes well for Varsity but IC really need to stop firing blanks - too many chances missed and squandered.