MEN'S CUP RESULTS

Barford Tigers    6    -    2    Sutton Coldfield       
                              
Beeston      12    -    1   Rugby & East Warwickshire       
                              
Berkswell & Balsall Common     0    -    12     Bournville       
                              
Brighton and Hove        4    -    3        Sutton Valence       
                              
Bromley and Beckenham     4    -    3   London Wayfarers    
            AET
                  
Brooklands MU     5    -    3      Timperley       
                              
Cannock     7    -    1      Leek       
                              
Didsbury Northern     1    -    5      Sheffield Hallam       
                              
Doncaster    2    -    6     Bowdon       
                              
Eastbourn        -    Holcombe    w/o to Holcombe   
                              
Eastcote   1    -    5     Sevenoaks      
                              
Exeter & Culm Vale Hornets     1    -    3    Isca      
                              
Hampstead & Westminster     (  1   )    2    -    2    (  1   )    Southgate       
* Hampstead & Westminster win 3-2 on penalty flicks
                              
Havant     8    -    0     Crawley       
                              
Indian Gymkhana     3    -    3   Lewes       
* Lewes win on sudden death penalty flicks
                              
Leamington     0    -    4      Leicester    
                                    
                            
Long Sutton     3    -    4    City of Peterborough       
                              
Marlow      3    -    2    Canterbury       
                              
Old Loughtonians      5    -    2      Chelmsford       
                              
Oxford Hawks     1    -    4     Reading      
                              
Oxted       3    -    2       Milton Keynes       
                              
Preston       4    -    2      Alderley Edge       
                              
Ramgarhia HC Southall    0    -    6     Fareham      
                              
Robinson's      0    -    6      Team Bath Buccaneers       
                              
Surbiton      11    -    2      Chichester       
                              
Teddington     4    -    3       West Herts       
            AET
                  
University of Birmingham    4    -    3       Belper       
                              
University of Cambridge       6    -    1       Norwich City       
                              
Waltham Forest       2    -    6      Cambridge City       
                              
Wisbech Town        2    -    3       St. Albans       
                              
Yate     2    -    3       Bristol Firebrands      
                           

LOTS OF GOALS IN YESTERDAY'S LEAGUE MATCHES. A round-up of Saturday's NOW Pensions and Investec League matches.

Yesterday saw lots of hockey and lots of goals in the England Hockey League. TalkHockeyRadio was at the double header at Holcombe, which was a late finish, and hence our round-up of Saturday’s hockey appears this morning.

In the NOW Pensions Men’s Premier Division, the match of the day was the game between table leaders East Grinstead and Beeston at Saint Hill. A goal from Richard Lawrence and two from Sam Ward gave the Nottingham side a 0-3 lead, which they retained until the 70^th minute, when Ashley Jackson grabbed a late goal from a penalty corner. Final score 1-3 to Beeston. Three points for Beeston puts them at the top of the table, and makes them the only team in the division with a 100% record.

Surbiton keep their second place, despite only being able to draw at home to newly promoted Wimbledon.  It was the legendary game of two halves, with Wimbledon’s Chris Gregg and Ben Hawes scoring in the first half, and Surbiton’s Ben Tibble and Matt Daly scoring in the second. Final score, 2-2. 

The match at Reading, who were at home to Cannock, was more a game of one half, with all seven goals being scored in the first 35 minutes. Final score there, 5-2 to Reading. Cannock have yet to win a game, and are now languishing in ninth place. The other struggler, newly promoted Sheffield Hallam, went down 0-2 at home to Hampstead & Westminster. Sheffield drop to bottom place in the table.

Canterbury managed to put recent setbacks behind them by recording their first win (and points) of the season, with a decent 4-1 victory over Loughborough Students.  This lifts them off the bottom of the table into eighth place, one behind the Students. 

Up until yesterday Olton & West Warwicks had recorded a worrying 17 goals conceded in two matches in the Investec Women’s Premiership.  This has now risen to 29 after their visit to Surbiton yesterday. Sandra Frankland (2), Jenna Woolven (3), Sarah Page, Giselle Ansley, Georgie Twigg, Emily Atkinson and Chloe Strong, all managed to score for the home side, plus two own goals gifted by Olton, brought the score to 12-1. 

Only one team in the division remains with a 100% record and that is Canterbury. They were visiting Bowdon Hightown, who were in the same position until the two sides met yesterday. A single goal from Canterbury’s Anna Baker saw the visitors retain their record. Bowdon drop like a stone from top of the Premiership to fifth. These things happen early in the season, as Beeston discovered. An excellent start to the season has been followed by two defeats, yesterday’s at  home to Reading, where they lost 0-3. Beeston have now slipped to seventh place.

Clifton, who always seem to be good at making the early season running, kept up their record thanks to a 62 minute goal from Els Mansell at University of Birmingham. Final score 2-3 and they are now in third place, behind Surbiton on goal difference. Leicester, who are in an unfamiliar position in seventh place, helped their cause with a 1-2 win away at Sutton Coldfield.  Sutton is now one of three sides on zero points and find themselves sandwiched between University of Birmingham and Olton at the bottom. 

TalkHockeyRadio got two for the price of one yesterday when we visited the double header at Holcombe. Their men were playing Brighton & Hove, whilst their women were playing Ipswich.  Both games had striking similarities. Their opponents were both sides who have not had good starts to the season, and both Holcombe’s men and women looked as if in they could inflict a rout on their opponents, but only the women achieved it.

Holcombe men were playing East Conference new boys Brighton, who were clearly outclassed by the home side.  But Brighton made a game of it and, after Robert Field had given Holcombe a 14^th minute lead, they managed to force an own goal.  Going into the second half at 1-1, less than a minute elapsed before Danny Hall found himself with the ball and unmarked in the ‘D’, and took a scored a goal that was so cool that it made cucumbers look positively warm. 2-1 to Holcombe. From thereon Brighton started to look more and more vulnerable, but somehow managed to keep the score down to a respectable level, with Gareth Andrew and David Appleton adding to Holcombe's tally to give them a 4-1 win. Some credit goes to Brighton for retaining self-respect in the face of a team full of stars, including Barry Middleton and Dan Fox.  But one is left asking why Holcombe did not make more of the evident difference between the two sides.

The same criticism cannot be levelled at Holcombe’s women. Unlike Brighton, Ipswich has a long and proud tradition in the England Hockey League, although their recent form in the Investec Women’s Conference East has been disappointing.  Shelley Russell gave Holcombe an early lead, but the home side were unable to build on this, and all the indications were that a breakaway might give the visitors a goal or two.  The second half started well for Holcombe, with Russell scoring her second, but the match was not wrapped up until the last 20 minutes which saw five goals from Holcombe, three within the space of two minutes. The final score, 7-0, puts Holcombe at the top of the East Conference, as the only side with a 100% record. A superb display of joined-up hockey, with their newly acquired Laura Unsworth and Maddie Hinch making a full contribution.

Holcombe’s men have a game in hand, and their 100% record only puts them in second place. Top of the NOW Pensions East Conference is Southgate, who beat Cambridge City 2-0 yesterday. But the headline match from yesterday’s men’s Conferences must be Teddington’s 0-10 win at St Albans. Clearly the Saints new pitch not bringing them luck. Surprisingly, this is Teddington’s first win of the season. St Albans sink to the bottom of the table, below Brighton & Hove on goal difference. 

In the other men’s Conferences, Cardiff & Met are the only side in the West with a 100% record. They beat Bath Buccaneers 0-5. Guildford are having a dreadful start to the season and remain at the bottom of the West table after losing 2-0 at University of Birmingham. The North table is led by University of Durham, ahead of Bowdon on goal difference. Bowdon beat bottom of the table strugglers West Bridgford 2-4 and the University won their match against Brooklands MU 1-2.

In the Investec women’s Conferences, Whitley Bay & Tyneside drop out of the top spot in the North after losing 1-2 to University of Durham. Wakefield replace them after a 1-2 win at Loughborough Students. New girls, Boots, remain out of luck with a 4-1 defeat at Brooklands Poynton. They remain at the foot of the table. Better luck for the other newbies, Kendall, who won a point with a 3-3 result against Ben Rhydding. In the West Conference, Buckingham’s winning habit continues with a 3-1 win against Trojans. They are ahead of Slough on goal difference. Slough recorded a 2-1 win against Barnes.

PICTURES FROM THE MATCHES AT HOLCOMBE CAN BE FOUND AT WWW.HOCKEYIMAGES.CO.UK. FULL RESULTS AND TABLES ARE ON OUR MAIN WEB SITE.

'GRINSTEAD IN NINE GOAL BONANZA. A report on today's matches in the NOW Pensions Men's Hockey League.

We had harboured suspicions for a couple of seasons that Canterbury had benefited from the disruption caused pre and post Olympics, and their match against East Grinstead may prove to be the writing on the wall for their future in the Premier Division.  They went down to a massive 1-9 defeat at home, with Ashley Jackson, Mark Pearn and David Condon scoring a brace apiece, with other goals coming from Niall Stott, Tony Wilson and Andy Piper. The win promotes EG to first place on goal difference.

Surbiton are in second place after travelling to Sheffield Hallam and coming away with a 1-3 win. Sharing maximum points with East Grinstead and Surbiton is Beeston, who remain in third place after beating Reading 4-3, despite a late revival by the Berkshire side. 

Newly promoted Wimbledon picked up their first points after winning at Cannock. Cannock share the distinction with Canterbury and Sheffield Hallam of being the three Premiership sides on zero points.  

Loughborough Students were nailed by Will Naylor, who scored two of Hampstead & Westminster’s four goals in their 4-1 win over the Students. H & W are in sixth place, one place behind Wimbledon.

The East Conference table is in a state of flux after Holcombe’s match at Oxted last night had to be abandoned due to a floodlight failure. As a result Holcombe have slipped to third, with Southgate taking the top spot after beating newly promoted Brighton & Hove 1-5 this afternoon. In second place is Bromley & Beckenham, who beat St Albans 4-2.  St Albans and Brighton & Hove have still to earn a point after two matches. 

In the North Conference the table has split into the haves and have nots. Four sides are on six points and four sides have still to earn a point.  Leek and Bowdon picked up three each at the expense of the newly promoted clubs. Leek beat West Bridgford 6-0, and Bowdon beat  Deeside Ramblers 1-2.  Top of the table on goal difference is University of Durham, who won their away match at Wakefield 0-4. 

In the West Conference, Cardiff and Met, who will be representing Wales in next month’s EuroHockey League, are top of the table after beating University of Exeter 4-2. They are ahead (on goal difference) of Team Bath Buccaneers, who won 2-4 away at Isca.

TalkHockeyRadio was at the West Conference match between Guildford and Fareham. Old hands might have trouble coming to terms with the fact that the once great Guildford is playing in the Conferences, but on today’s form they might have to get used to an England Hockey League without them at all.  Last season the two sides finished at more-or-less opposite ends of the table, with Guildford in third and Fareham eighth.  Either Fareham have gained something or Guildford have lost something during the Summer.

Typically of early season games, the two sides spent some time sizing each other up, with each probing the other’s strengths and weaknesses. Robin Jones opened the scoring for Fareham from a penalty corner, but their lead was short lived. Mike Rippon scored for Guildford shortly afterwards. But in the second half the Fareham forwards started to slice through the Guildford defence, with goals from Danny Rawlings, Alex Boxall and Christopher Davey.  With an own goal to add to the tally, the final score was 1-5.  One has to feel sorry for Guildford goalkeeper, Ed Burton-Brown, who was deputising for an injured Simon Mason. The more experienced Mason might have saved a couple of the shots, but Burton-Brown coped well with the storm and pulled off a couple of good saves. 

IMAGES FROM THIS MATCH ARE AT WWW.HOCKEYIMAGES.CO.UK.

FULL TABLES AND RESULTS ARE AVAILABLE ON OUR MAIN WEB SITE.

DOUBLE HAT-TRICK FOR DANSON AS OLTON COLLAPSE. A round-up of today's Investec League matches.

Reading’s Alex Danson scored a double hat-trick in the Investec Women’s Premier Division this afternoon when Reading put Olton & West Warwicks to the sword. Olton were two down after only two minutes of play, and although the scored was a relatively modest 0-4 at half time, it was the second half that saw the home side collapse to lose the match 0-12. 

Olton look like early strugglers in the Premiership with zero points and 17 goals conceded in two games.  Sutton Coldfield are also looking for points after losing 1-3 at home to Surbiton.  Sutton Coldfield had taken a 15^th minute lead thanks to Emma Macabe, who recently moved from Olton, but Georgie Twigg scored from the penalty spot ten minutes later. Second Half goals from Vicky Bryant and Becky Herbert finally sealed Sutton’s fate.

Beeston’s second match in the Premier Division ended in disappointment when they went down to a Zoe Leach penalty stroke after 40 minutes away at Clifton.  Final score there, 1-0.   

Canterbury have a late start, playing at home to Birmingham University.  Until we know that result, the only team to have taken maximum points is Bowdon Hightown.  Bowdon were away to Leicester, and a Natalie Wray penalty corner give the visitors a 0-1 win. 

In the East Conference Holcombe kept up the charge with a 1-3 win over Harleston Magpies and are the Conference leaders. Two Sussex clubs who drew last weekend, move into second and third place on the back of wins this afternoon. East Grinstead beat Ipswich 1-2 away and Horsham recorded a 0-1 win away at Chelmsford.

The clash between the two newly promoted clubs in the Investec North Conference resulted in a 1-3 result, with one side scoring half the goals. Boots gifted an own goal to Kendal, who went on to score two more of their own. The win elevates Kendal into fifth place. The table is lead by Whitley Bay & Tynemouth, who overcame Ben Rhydding 1-0 at home.

In the Investec West Conference Buckingham had to be content with a more modest score than last weekend, but their 0-2 win over Barnes keeps them at the top of the Conference with a hefty goal difference advantage.  Slough seem determined to confound their detractors with their second win in two games, this time beating Gloucester City 2-0. Oxford Hawks recorded the highest scoring tally of the day in the Conferences by beating Trojans 6-1. 

FULL RESULTS AND TABLES CAN BE FOUND ON OUR MAIN WEB SITE.

15 GOALS AT HOME FOR HOLCOMBE. An update to yesterday's round-up, looking at the Conference results.

The full league results were late in last night due to some late afternoon starts, but we thought they might be worth an update as there were some interesting results in both the men’s and women’s Conferences, particularly concerning the newly promoted clubs.

Looking first at the NOW Pensions Men’s League, the most eye-catching result of the day was the final score in the match between East Conference Holcombe and Cambridge City.  Holcombe had some impressive signings during the Summer, whilst Cambridge City had narrowly avoided relegation last season, and this is reflected in the score.  Headline catching signing (and you heard about it here first!) Barry Middleton contributed two goals to Holcombe’s 8-1 win, with the dependable Danny Hall adding two, and other goals from Richard Lane, Gareth Andrew (2) and James Stedman. 

Both the newly promoted East Conference clubs, Brighton & Hove and St Albans, suffered defeats. Brighton went down 4-0 away at Old Loughtonians, all four goals being scored in the last 20 minutes. St Albans lost 0-3 at home to Oxted. Also in the East Conference, Teddington were well in the driving seat when the visited relegated Southgate.  With 18 minutes to go they were 1-3 up, and went on to lose the match 4-3!

It was a similar story in the North, with West Bridgford losing their match at home to Khalsa 2-5, and Deeside Ramblers losing 2-3 to Leek. Relegated Brooklands MU started their bid to return to the Premiership with a 3-0 win over Wakefield.

In the West Conference, Isca were another newly promoted club who failed to win any points. Despite staging a late rally they went down 3-2 at University of Birmingham. 

In the Investec Women’s Conferences there were points to be won by the new girls, none more emphatically than by Holcombe, who won their match against Wimbledon 7-0. Anyone lucky enough to be at their double header would have seen a total of 15 goals scored. It must have been quite a day at Holcombe Park.

As mentioned in last night’s report, TalkHockeyRadio was at Saint Hill for East Grinstead’s double headers.  Accompanied by the sound of passing steam trains on the newly extended Bluebell Railway, it’s questionable whether the two sides were quite so chuffed with the result.  Chelmsford really struggled last season, and faced with a newly promoted East Grinstead in the East Conference they seemed to lack confidence. Jo-Jo Davies’ first half penalty corner strike for EG put them on the back foot, but they came out for the second period looking much more confident and were rewarded with a Kate Maxey penalty corner goal to end the match 1-1. To the casual visitor this must have looked like a training game, as Chelmsford had turned up with only white shirts and had to wear training bibs for the entire match to avoid a clash with their white shirted opponents.  (Pictures from this match are on our Pictures page at www.HockeyImages.co.uk).

The hunting was not so happy for the debutants in the North Conference.  Kendal was sunk by a late goal by Michelle Cooling in their match against Whitley Bay & Tynemouth. Boots scored two goals in the last five minutes away at Doncaster, but the deficit was already too great and they lost 5-3.  At the top of the table a hat-trick by Brooklands Poynton’s Lindsay Rachubka in their 4-0 win over Stourport, puts them in the lead on goal difference.

In the West Conference, Exe had a disappointing return to the big time with a 3-0 defeat at Gloucester City. Recently relegated Slough has not quite yet gone into the anticipated melt-down, as was shown by their 2-4 win away at Trojans.  The winning goals were both scored in the last five minutes and were credited to Christie Fearnside and Amy Sheehan. 

With the number of times that Buckingham has failed to gain promotion from the West Conference there were fears that they might run out of steam but, if their opening match was any guide, it’s still full steam ahead. They broke the England Hockey League record for the day with 11 goals at home to Bristol Firebrands, with no less than seven players on the scoresheet.  Just for the record, they were: Kitty Higgins, Lorraine Campbell (2), Anita Bazini, Jessica Bloom (2), Samantha Sandham (3), Jazmine Needham and Jo Ellis.