Taking the Sting out of the Police…
Following on from 3 plus months' worth of training and the lightning excitement / postponed game the week before, the men's prem team was chomping at the bit for the first game to arrive.
The opposition this week was The Police and while they were without Sting in their line-up, we knew they would still be a formidable opponent, being regulars in the Prem division. As this was our first foray into the lofty heights of this league, we were the New Kids on the Block, but would we be Hangin' Tough…?
We began the first half strongly, holding possession and controlling the middle of the park and occasionally finding joy down the flanks as foreseen by our handlers Sanjay and Roy. However the Police, were not to be denied, and through a mixture of their inside out passes, they slowly exerted their presence in the match and took the lead with some solid attack play. Their joy was short-lived though as we stormed back into the game courtesy of our Scraggy (Scooby-doo) look-alike, Ben, crashing the ball past their helpless keeper with his lovely reverse stick shot on edge of the D – game on. We then confirmed our dominance in the game with some slick work down the wing from our resident Kiwi and Vet, Joran and Olly, combining well to feed Hoirul (or MJ after Sat night) sliding in at the goal and Tornado's were truly up and running in the league.
We went in at H-Time, knowing The Police were going to come out strongly in the second half, but rallying words from cowboy Johny, ensured we were suitably geed up for their riposte.
The second half typified the Tornados spirit with some tireless running from all 16 of the guys, under the blistering sun. While the ref was preventing Jan from wielding his usual dominance down the left hand side, we found other avenues to attack from; however the ever imposing Police with 'every breath they took' were also gaining momentum that broke our backline to level up at 2 apiece. Worse was to come as some debatable decision-making in our D led to a penalty flick, this meant that the stage was set for Adi "I fly in from KL for the games" to continue his impressive form in between the sticks. Adi duly obliged and saved down low to his right and with 5 or so minutes to go the game was set for a grandstand finish.
The grandstand finish was delivered when having won a short corner in the last minute of the game, Ben stepped up, for one of the last times as a Tornado, and proceeded to do what he did all last year and drag it into the roof of the goal. Game finished - Tornados win 3-2 on our first ever Prem league outing – a great effort from all involved and we're nicely set for the rest of the season.
Unofficial MOM – Ben 'Unchained'
Lyrics by Barny
Hockey poetry Barney boy!
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