At the midway point in the season, Kings United really stamped its mark on the premier men’s hockey competition.
Its 3-1 victory over University Blue Whales in the shield challenge at the weekend was the latter’s first loss of the season and can only be good for the evenness of the competition, although the sky blues may not agree.
The boys in white appeared to be extremely keen to get engaged in the contest right from the start.
After putting the pressure on early, Kings opened the scoring when Sam Young converted a penalty corner. Often, conceding a goal can spur the competition leaders into action, but University seemed a bit sluggish, compared with its previous encounters. Craig Turner added a second for Kings after he found himself in behind the usually very organised Whales backs.
With veteran James Nation missing, it was left to former university player Hitaua Doyle to organise Kings, and he continued his strong season driving its players around the pitch.
Kings added a third goal, to Sam Chandler, and put the match beyond doubt, although the competition’s leading goal scorer, Henry Will was able to grab one back for Uni to avoid its first blank of the season.
It was a case of not having a good day for the competition leader, and the players will be looking to recover quickly, as they have some extra games coming up in the next few days, to make up matches missed while the national under-21 tournaments were on.
In the other match, four goals from Solomon Baldock led Taieri Tuataras in a big win over University Black 9-1, while Albany Alligators had the bye.
- Matthew West
