No quarter given or expected as Sutho U17 Metro took on Northern Districts on Friday night – Rory Staples picture
Our Club’s big week began at its Committee meeting on Monday night, when we formally signed the contract to replace the synthetic grass carpet on our field.
The project, which will begin immediately after the end of the summer comp and be completed in January (including breaks for Christmas), will cost more than $$320,000. After years of prudent saving and management of our money, we will be able to pay for it without external funding.
The result will be the very finest standard playing surface that will deliver a quality experience to all our players for many years to come.
The committee is also examining lights and watering systems, but there will be no extension of current playing or training hours. Both power and water are significant contributors to our cost base and we are looking at efficiencies.
When the existing synthetic grass is removed, club members will have a chance to get pieces for either posterity or a bit of no-care greenery for around the house. Less time mowing and more time at the hockey!
Then, on Saturday, an agreement was signed with Sutherland Shire Council for our Club to take full responsibility for the clubhouse and the area within the fence for the next three years.
This is in lieu of a longer term lease, which we would have preferred, but this cannot be entered into before the settling of an Aboriginal Land Claim over all Crown Land in the Sydney Basin. The Council, which is managing the process in its area, cannot give any indication of when the matter could be settled – hence the initial short-term lease.
Now to on-field matters, with several Sutho teams already in finals and others about to begin.
Special thanks to our photo contributors this week: Anna Domrow, Graeme Cartwright, Matt Morris and Rory Staples.
Men
Sutho 1st grade 7 Gordon North Sydney 3
Once again we were missing Kieran Govers and Alex Shaw to injuries. Its seems like a plague this season with the number of injuries between 2nd and 1st grades.
To get our full strength team on the field this year has just not happened and doesn’t look like it will.
However, we still played extremely well with a great spread of goal scorers, as can be seen on the score sheet. We have the luxury of having a number of goal scorers in the team which is usually a light area.
This was the final round game of the season which saw us come in 2nd in the minor premiership to Moorebank on goal difference (3) but equal on points.
The real test will come this coming week end when we play Moorebank in the major semi final at 6 pm Saturday, at Moorebank. It should be a torrid battle between the two teams and hopefully we will come out victorious.
It would be great to see all the club get behind us and the other grades competing in semifinals that day with 2nd grade at 4 pm.
B & F: Jack Hayes 1, Shayne Smith 2, Matt Johnson 3. Goals: Jack Hayes 3, Matt Johnson, Cameron Buesnel, Christian Halyard and Matt Bennett 1 each.
Sutho 2nd grade GNS
No report provided
Sutho 3rd grade – bye
Sutho 4th grade GNS
No report provided
Sutho 5th grade (AKA the Rowling Stones) 3 Ryde 0 SEMI FINAL – Pictures Graeme Cartwright
Last Saturday our 5th grade men travelled out to Homebush to play their major semi against the team that narrowly pushed them out of top spot for the minor premiership the week before: Ryde.
The boys took the field after an inspiring pep talk from El Capitan Piles, ready to get the job done. Again, over 50% of the starting line up last name beginning with an “R”. and against RRRyde, too.
The first half started with Ryde having most of the possession but by no means looking at all dominant over our lads.
The intensity from both teams was high; however, after settling down Sutho started to put some great passes together and really build up our play and start to take control of the game. Piles, Mitch, Russ and Mitch Rowling controlled the centre of the field shutting down the Ryde play and giving us the opportunities up front we needed.
Sutho took the lead with 15 mins left in the first half through a successful short corner from Eythan Rowling. Geof Noy was sent off with a green not long after and we were forced to scramble and protect our lead. Ryde gained two short corners in this time and smelt a chance to equalise but our boys kept them out with Dan keeping us in the game at more than one point.
Back to full strength, a short corner and a drag flick hitting the post resulted in a stroke put away by Lachie Rowling to put Sutho 2-0 up and run it off for the half.
Heading into the second half with the lead was a luxury the 5th grade boys hadn’t had against this team since early on in the season. It was a nice feeling but the job still wasn’t done.
You could see both teams starting to really fatigue in the second half. Trying to slow the play down and play smarter not harder and focus on the basics was how Sutho was going to hold our lead and win this game.
But Ryde still had plenty of venom left and still kept us under the pump and looked dangerous with the ball.
A break down of play and a turn over in our defensive 25 saw Ryde off guard, with a quick overhead finding from Eythan found Lachie Cartwright on the attacking 25, who calmly beat the keeper and slotting it in to put us up 3-0.
Ryde continued to attack but with no success, our backs cleaning up everything in the circle and again with Dan in goal having an absolute blinder saving everything. Even with four short corners after the final whistle Ryde could not get past Dan. Fifth grade boys ended with the clean sheet and a place in the Grand Final!
Good job lads, one game to go
Sutho 6th grade 3 UTS 2 -SEMIFINAL
Well, we don’t like to do things the easy way in 6th Grade.
It was always going to be a possibility, playing 4th position UTS in this semi – a team we had beaten fairly comfortably the last few times we played them – that there could be a sense of complacency,especially with a lot of young guys in our team.
Unfortunately that’s what happened.We didn’t give the opposition the respect they deserved and before we knew it, we were down 2-0 at half time.
We just didn’t play with the intensity you need in semi finals.
Our man-on-man marking was non-existent and so we found ourselves scrambling all half. The exception was Max Heckley, who had a great first half chasing everything down and applying the little pressure we could put on UTS.
At half time the law was laid down to the boys: “Lift your game or our season would be over very quickly.”
I knew if we could relax and stick to our game plan we would be able to come home over the top of them.
The second half was played with a completely different attitude . We scored with a well structured passing play down the right side and finished off by Harrison. More goals followed to Luke and Jack Mecham and with some polished defence we now continue on to play Briars for a chance to get a shot at the grand final.
Women
Sutho 1st grade
No report provided
Sutho 3rd grade 1
No report provided
Sutho 3rd Grade Wildcats 1 v Pohogs 1 MAJOR SEMIFINAL
Wildcats were as ready as ever, with all the team present 30 minutes before the game! Throughout the season against Pohogs we had one win and a loss with games always very tight and hard fought.
The plan was to go out hard and try to mark the fast goal scoring Pohogs centre forward tightly.
Pohogs started out strongly and maintained the majority of possession for the first 15 minutes.
Wildcats defended well and eventually started to gain some momentum up front. We had a few opportunities to score before Kathleen managed to get a good shot on goal and past the goalie. Half time score 1-nil.
The second half saw Pohogs come out firing and at times losing their cool. Wildcats remained composed which frustrated Pohogs even more.
Again we had some opportunities to score, but we didn’t capitalise.
Pohogs had a short corner disallowed and then a penalty stroke saved spectacularly by Julie.
However in the last 10 minutess they scored against the play from a run away ball. Final score 1- all.
As Pohogs were placed first they went straight through to the grand final. Wildcats will play St George in the final this weekend. GO CATS!
Goal scorer: Kathleen Leach.
Metro
Sutho U17 Metro 7 Northern Districts 0 – Pictures courtesy Rory Staples
We celebrated our last trek to Pennant Hills for the season with a comprehensive 7-0 win over Northern Districts.
Our first half was a bit below par – the passing was a bit slow, our strikers weren’t doing enough to stretch the Northern District defence, and there were a few too many unforced errors in our build-up. This pretty much reflected the quality of our warmup.
With a bit more urgency to unload the ball from the start of the second half, and a bit more stretch from our strikers, we generated more forward pressure on Northern Districts and picked up our scoring rate.
The game marked the return of Grace Young to our attack after a few weeks out due to injury and rep commitments. She immediately slotted into the striker line, linking up well with our attack. Good to see her back on the field.
Semi-finals next Friday – 9pm at Homebush!
B&F: 1 each to Harry, Naomi, Blake, Donni, Grace and Staples. Goals: Harry 2, Donni 1, Staples 1, Turner 1, Blake 1, Hayden 1
Sutho U15 Metro 4 Northern Districts 0
Sutho took on Northern Districts on a cool Friday night at Pennant Hills.
We moved the ball well in the first half but got caught on a number of occasions in the middle holding onto the ball too long which slowed down a lot our attack.
ND countered a few times as well but we were able to diffuse in defence. The ND goal keeper made some good saves in the first half as we went directly at him.
In the second half we created a lot more chances and moved the ball well and went around the keeper to score four goals. It was a solid performance by the team, but we will need to continue working hard for finals.
Points: 3 Elliot, 2 Luca, 1 Kendelle.
Next Friday we take on the undefeated Briars team at Olympic Park.
We were beaten 4-1 in our last encounter only two weeks ago and will need better communication and a focus in defence if we are going to be a chance to beat them. The winner of the semi goes straight into the grand final.
Juniors
Sutho U17 Blue Tongues 3 Sutho U17 Geckos 1
To start off a cold Saturday morning we had Round 2 of the U17 Sutho derby between the Geckos and the Blue Tongues. In Round 1 the Geckos came out on top, and with that in mind the Blue Tongues were eager to get one back, although we knew it wasn’t going to be an easy task!
The game started off with an even tussle for possession, with both teams creating many scoring opportunities without any luck due to brilliant saves from both keepers.
The Blue Tongues struck first with good build up play leading into the circle where the shot was taken and then saved by the opposition keeper and bouncing straight to Kye on the opposite post who lined up a big swing to smash it into the goals giving the Blue Tongues the lead. Play continued with it still being a very even contest when against the run of play Kye somehow managing to squeeze the ball into the goal from the baseline!! This goal gave the Blue Tongues a 2-0 lead.
After this goal the Sutho Geckos came back very strongly and put us on the back foot immediately.
We struggled to get out of our own end, while our keeper Alec was under sustained pressure which he handled well. However, this wasn’t the case for much longer as they finally broke our defence and slipped in a goal on the back post. Going into half time the Blue Tongues were up 2-1.
The second half started off with a high pace and lots of running.
Each side fought for the ball and neither could crack the other’s defence despite creating many opportunities.
This went on for a good 15 minutes for the second half when Max picked the ball in the circle and could only shoot from his back stick. He took his chance to hit a tomahawk shot and to his amazement – and everyone else’s – he put it in the goal and ran back to half way with his jaw dropped.
This gave the Blue Tongues a 3-1 lead, which they held until full-time.
Goals: 2 Kye, 1 Max . Points: 2 Josh, and one each to Kye, Max, Lachie P and Alec.
Sutho U17 Geckos 1 Sutho Blue Tongues 3
Sutho U17s geckos played the other Sutho team on home turf.
We went down 3-1 in our first loss of the season, straying away from team goals.
Putting a positive spin on the outcome, the team has some things to work on and a fire in our bellies.
Special mention to a brilliant save on the goal line by Aaron who was moonlighting as a defender.
Sutho U15A Geckos 5 University of NSW 1
After a narrow upset loss last meeting with Uni, Sutho were taking no chances and flew specialist coaching resource in direct from China. This proved a master stroke, as with flu season in full swing our playing roster was reduced from 14 to 10, and we were also without our manager, so recruited Rebecca to take control.
Playing short, we opted for no right striker and were targeting our focus over recent weeks to dominate the midfield, be tight at the back, and not too direct in attack. Mostly we were successful.
Despite dominating the play we were on the wrong end of the short corner count for a second week, but again stood strong, showing much improvement defending opposition PCs.
Between excellent goal keeping and that one fewer striker, we found it hard to execute in the attacking circle despite continued strong midfield play. However, Adrian did deftly convert 2 first half chances for 2-0 half time lead.
Perhaps it was fatigue, but we struggled in the first half of Period 2 to control the game.
UNSW were lifting, and starting to penetrate through the midfield. Eventually they made an excellent run and scored, to put the pressure back on Sutho.
As if sensing the challenge, Oliver scored a couple of very skilful individual goals from the midfield in the space of a few minutes and the game was done. Adrian rounded things off towards the end to claim another well deserved hat trick.
There were solid performances across the paddock.
James was excellent again in goals, the back 3 of Keeghan, Elliot and Sean were solid, and Luke continually threatened and was in good position at left striker.
Our midfield excelled, with very high work rates from all. Zach was busy and efficient on the left, and Raina was outstanding as right AM, using the extra space without a right striker to switch between tight defending and wide attacking, and setup a number of great chances in attack. Her leadership as Captain was also impressive.
Adrian worked extremely hard in cover from the centre striker, and took his chances as a good striker should. As such, he deserved his 1 point.
Macca was everywhere at DM, and used speed and the extra responsibility in the middle to shut down the UNSW surges to good effect and earn the 2 points.
Finally, Oli had an outstanding game in the midfield, pushing up to support the depleted attack, and then covering back. His defence was tireless. He started many of our attacks, delivering crucial goals when needed. He was well clear in the votes for man of the match.
Next week we play St George Knights for second spot on the table (subject to results in the final round the week after). Hopefully we are back to full strength.
Points: Oliver 3, Macca 2, Adrian 1. Goals: Adrian 3, Oliver 2.
Sutho U13A Geckos 5 UNSW
The Geckos had an unexpected draw against UNSW in the last encounter between these teams, so they weren’t taking them as lightly this time round.
Both teams started well initially, however the Geckos soon began to dominate the play, but couldn’t score. Matty had worked the ball close to the circle and delivered two good balls into the strikers who were unable to convert. Tomas had also controlled the ball down towards the backline and his two passes into the circle sailed straight through without any Sutho players getting a stick on the crosses.
We eventually scored off a short corner. Matty had dribbled the ball into the circle and met some strong tackling by UNSW – although none of the tackle managed to touch the ball – resulting in Matty being tripped to the ground. But not to worry, Matty made UNSW pay for their wayward tackling by slotting home the short corner for the team’s first goal.
The Geckos’ second goal started with Bree in the mids working the ball up the left side before off-loading to Jett who did exactly what was practiced in training: taking the ball down to the backline and crossed it around the keeper for Tomas to tap in a well-constructed goal.
Not to be out-done however, UNSW were soon on the attack and earned a short corner following a Gecko mistake inside our circle. Although UNSW hit a cracker of a shot at goal, it was saved brilliantly by Lily who was goalkeeper for the match.
Just before half-time, the Geckos earned a short corner and Matty converted after some excellent stick skills inside the crowded circle.
So with a 3-0 lead at half-time, the Geckos seemed to relax for the first 10 minutes of the second half with neither team controlling the ball well. Both teams had their chances, with Lily again making some good saves for the Geckos, and UNSW eventually managing to score, making it 3-1.
That seemed to wake the Geckos up, and they were soon on the attack with Fletcher scoring for the Geckos at the other end. The remainder of the half was a bit scrappy, but some very good stick work from Lachlan resulted in him beating the keeper to score the Gecko’s fifth goal for a 5-1 win.
Best & Fairest: Jonty Austin 2 pts; Tom de Soza 2 pts; Lachlan Staples 2 pts. Scorers: Matty 2, Fletcher, Tomas, Lachlan.
Sutho U13B Blue Tongues 2 University of NSW 0
Today’s game was action-packed, with the team achieving an excellent 2-0 victory.
Everyone played a great game with lots of running in attack and defence.
Our big opportunity to improve is ensuring we mark our opposition players and run back to make sure our defence is solid.
Thanks to Peter Tait for stepping in at very late notice to expertly umpire our game.
Best and fairest: 3 Chris Goodman, 2 Lachlan Duhne, 1 Myles Hanrahan. Scorers: Finn Wille 1, Chris Goodman 1.
Sutho U13B Thorny Devils 2 Glebe Hornets 1 – Pictures courtesy Matt Morris
‘Finals here we come’ with this win placing the Thorny Devils securely in 4th place with no chance of elimination from the final draw, representing our build and ability growth throughout the year well.
That said, it is no time to lose momentum, and plenty of opportunity to change rank in the final 4 depending on other results.
Our field play was showing the skills and attitude that we have been working towards for the whole season, with better field positioning, and controlled passing which had Glebe on their back foot for most of the game, and allowed us to open up on some options that have seemed to elude us so far.
There was many examples of clean 2 and 3 pass combinations that placed us in striking distance too many times to count, keeping Glebe in a heavy defensive mode all day.
Harley is improving in his promotion to centre of the defence line, and found some nice clearance during the game.
Nick had some impressive moves on the line, keeping the communication up to identify himself as an good option, and delivering some very nice play when in charge of the ball.
Owen was Mr. Dependable today, with the quickest tackle/trap pass in the game, turning the tide of play in many defensive wins.
Our midfield combination of Kai and Mackenzie is strengthening as they learn to use each other in attack and defence, and Mackenzie’s planned move on the short corner was an excellent example of leadership in attack.
Jack was unlucky not to bag a few more goals, but was met by heavy defence in most exchanges.
A big thanks to Josh for jumping into goals today with some impressive saves including a high stick save that would have been a certain goal.
No time to relax at this end of the season, and with our consistent build in ability and match play, we are in for a good chance for the remaining games, and final series.
Go Sutho!!
Best and fairest: 3 pts Ethan Locke, 2 Mackenzie Shaw, 1 Owen Laycock. Goals: Jack Treharne and Amerlia Domrow 1 each. Scorers: Jack Treharne – 1 Amelia Domrow – 1
Sutho U11A Geckos 8 UNSW 0
An early start at the neutral Moorebank venue didn’t mean a sleepy start to the game.
A magnificent first half generated 8 goals, 4 of which were nailed by the in-form Josh!
The ledger was levelled due to the mercy rule being enforced, and the reduced number of Sutho players on the field seemed to extinguish the scorching goalscoring fest in the 2nd half.
Again, it was great to see the game structure coming together at the important end of the season, although, we need to keep the tiger in our tanks, regardless of the score line.
This is especially when playing against the higher ranked teams who can turn the game around in an instant. Congratulations team on a top result!
Players Player: Josh 3, Amy 2, Rhys – 1. Goals: Josh 4, Kai 2, Jack 1, Peter 1.
Sutho Under 11 Bearded Dragons 2 Bankstown 0 – Pictures courtesy of Anna Domrow
After a draw in their prior clash, tensions were high as the Bearded Dragons battled a strong Bankstown team who had home ground advantage, and plenty of supporters to cheer them on.
However, the Bearded Dragons weren’t fazed by any of this as they focused on their two main objectives for the day – to win, and to get Bethany on the scoreboard.
As always, the team looked to get the ball out wide and into space before crossing into the D for a shot on goal and after a few attempts the Bearded Dragons achieved one of their objectives – Bethany scored her first goal of the season. Thomas then took the lead out to 2 when he sent the ball rocketing towards the goal from the top of the D.
Bankstown came out strong after half-time, determined to claw back on the scoreboard but despite Bankstown winning many short corners, Emily and Kaylee were strong at the back and shut down the Bankstown strikers attempts at goal. Riley also made life difficult for Bankstown with some great goal keeping.
Dominic had a solid game showing his ability to defend well and then turn the defence into attack.
The Bearded Dragons achieved their objective to win by keeping Bankstown scoreless in a hard fought game. Well done! Another great game to watch.
Best and fairest: 3pts Dominic Lenzo, 2pts Bethany Domrow, 1pt Jack Margetson. Scorers: Bethany, Thomas.
