With only a couple of rounds remaining and a tightly contested battle for first place, the Gloucester Panthers men’s hockey division 3 team needed a convincing win to help resecure their position on the top again.
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Last Saturday (August 11), the Panthers faced off against the Taree Tigers Leagues team.
Despite a few injured players, they took to the field determined to make an impact and get back to their passing game that got them to their position throughout the first half of the competition.
They lead well and began moving the ball around the field, giving very few opportunities for the Tigers to break away, only picking up on an occasional lose ball from a missed pass.
The Taree team however were quickly shut down, lead by Bruce Snape and Vic Tonks.
Callum Howard proved to be a driving force down the right side making some valuable breaks and feeding passes back into the centre.
The first break came for the team early as a lose ball in the D set Mark Coombes up for a shot at goal which he converted.
Not long after, Callum Howard lead a charge through the middle to convert Gloucester’s second goal for the match.
Paul Rosenbaum was instrumental in the centre alongside Dale Tonks in setting up plays and movement around the field.
Unfortunately Trevor Bolton went off the field early after he aggravated an existing injury where he remained for the rest of the match.
Play carried on with several more attempts at goal just going wide until Callum Howard again, alone in attack skirted around three Tigers players and took the goal keeper on one-on-one to flick it around and behind to score his second goal and the team’s third.
The second half saw more of the same play from the Panthers team and despite a few conceded short corners, Panthers’ keeper, James Mclaughlan took some diving tackles to keep Taree scoreless.
When Gloucester were awarded their own short corners in the second half, they started to alternate their striker to keep the defence on their toes.
First a shot from Dale Tonks made its way through to the goal and then when Bruce Snape stepped up, he also hit with deadly accuracy.
With a second goal to captain Mark Coombes throughout the match, the Panthers finished out the game with a 6-0 win over the Taree Tigers.
Next week they take on the Chatham Wolves, followed by a bye before the semi-finals begin.
