KEW Hockey Club

Kew 4 def Camberwell 1

Games against the Orange men tend to be well contested, closely fought and somewhat predictable. More Human Nature than Michael Jackson you might say. Lots of well tailored rugby tops and chinos and plenty of cinnamon bun to go around. But ultimately lacking any of the real magic like when Jacko came to town.

Perhaps Jacko’s death had unsettled things. The warm up was disjointed and poor. The last person in your team you want getting the game time wrong is your Goal Keeper. Alex Tan’s misread of the Team sheet leaving us exposed at the back and Jono donning a helmet.

However, this didn’t seem to unsettle us too much as we controlled the play with Tags, Tommy Clements, Hamish Nelson and Nath Stevens flipping the ball around between the with comforting ease. Club Coach Cracka help organise the defence from Larry Left Half, whilst Winny also saw plenty of the ball.

The first goal was a fitting reward for our early dominance. Lachie Walmsley with a deft look away goal that broke sprits.

Hubba (our resident Goal Machine) and Stevie Gale combined well to force a corner and our dominance was total. Tom Clements showed he has one of the sweetest hits of a ball you are likely to see with a pile driver into the backboard. And after repeating the dose, Kew had skipped to an early 3-0 lead with winners everywhere.

But tragedy struck. Tags, the teams spiritual leader at Centre Half, went down clutching his knee. This forced a re-shuffle and caused us to momentarily lose momentum.

After the break we continued to control the play. But we lacked our cutting edge. Many corners went begging. And of course, what happened? They scored to get back to 3-1 totally against the run of play. All of a sudden they had a sniff and started pressuring us. Until the watershed moment of the match where Tan Man made up for his late arriving with a sublime save to keep the score at 3-1 with ten minutes to go, when it seemed a goal was inevitable.

This chastened Kew and stiffened our resolve. We regained control and then put in a final goal, courtesy of another Tom Clements special on a penalty corner.

The final score was 4-1. Probably a goal or two short of par. But a wins a win. And you need a few along of them along the way to make the finals.

We wish Tags a speedy recovery as we look to pick up some more wins in the lead up to the finals.

PS. The author apologises for the teams non-entry last week: a top of the table clash vs. Footscray. Despite a depleted line-up we won 6-2, including a magnificent haul of five goals to Hubba.