Youth no barrier for Souths A-grade side
HOCKEY ON the surface, the history books will make it appear as though Souths’ A-grade women’s minor premiership was just a continuation of several seasons of dominance.
But 2017 has been far from it, which makes it all the more sweet.
A 3-0 win over Stingers on Saturday night was all it took for the top spot to be sealed and Souths captain Caitlyn Whipp was thoroughly satisfied after the change that swept through the club in the off-season.
“It’s all pretty exciting,” she said.
“We had a talk about it last week before we played Brothers, saying how no one expected us to be in this position.
“A lot of hard work has contributed to it and that’s what gets you minor premierships. Saints 2 d Brothers 0 Stingers 4 (Richardson 2, Ivory, M Sestero goals) d Souths 3 (Whipp, Darbyshire, Rodman goals)
“We definitely deserve it. We’ve not only proved it to ourselves we could do it, having such a young side, we proved it to everyone else as well.”
Whipp said Souths were now “exactly where we want to be” to do the double again, but said the squad would spend the next two weeks wisely, expecting to have to play their best game to win the decider.
The 19-year-old has been one of the older heads of the minor premierships charge, which has her on the shortlist for women’s player of the year, but the fact Sarah Cochran is among the six nominated is testament to just how much youth talent is among Souths’ ranks.
While the club has a bye this weekend and can prepare for the A-grade grand final, it won’t stop eight of them still eligible to play in the S1 division knockout semi-final this Friday night.
Saints beat Brothers 1-0 over the weekend, but the two will face off again on Sunday for the right to battle Souths in the grand final just as they did last season.
Brothers will welcome back their Queensland Country contingent – albeit a tired one – of Haylee Brodin and Leigh Thomas for the semi-final clash.
Saints and Brothers will also contest the A-grade men’s semi-final.
Saints booked their finals place with a 2-0 win over Brothers on Saturday and it proved essential when Stingers, who were beaten grand finalists in 2016, beat Souths in the later Round 18 fixture.
While finals fever takes over hockey, Cairns Hockey Association has announced the shortlist for men’s and women’s player of the year.
All four clubs are represented among the six nominees in each.
Haylee Brodin, Rebecca Fatnowna (both Brothers), supposedly retired Rhylee Penrigh (Saints) and Phoebe Nixon (Stingers) are on the shortlist alongside Whipp and Cochran (Souths).
Brett Borresen, Matt Cook (Stingers), Bob Barron (Saints), Jarrod Holmes (Brothers) and Deyonte Fraser (Souths) are the five men’s nominees.
The A-grade semi-finals will be played on Sunday, starting with the men at 4pm and women at 5.30pm. WOW.
What a weekend of netball. The Netball Queensland High Performance Camp on Saturday saw the best netballers aged 16 to 18 attend from the Marlin Coast region.
The players and coaches were exposed to the coaching expertise of Simone Nalatu, the current Queensland 17 and under coach.
As a coach, I thought she was amazing and her camp was based around one-on-one defence.
The umpires were also mentored and worked with Leanne Quilter.
Fowlers Junior Carnival was a huge success on Sunday with the 10 and 12 years divisions highly contested with 10 teams in each division.
A massive day for our youngsters but they played amazingly and with the best spirit.
We are grateful for the support and contribution of the Fowlers Group, as Bob and Jill Fowler have sponsored netball in the Marlin Coast region, school carnivals and Cairns Netball for the past 15 years.
Without their dedicated and continued support, all of our carnivals for our junior players could not exist.
We as sporting organisations are so eternally grateful for all sponsors support and seriously could not continue to offer amazing carnivals without them.
Cairns Netball are gearing up and preparing for the Nissan QLD Cup.
The two-day carnival will begin on Friday night with the opening ceremony and continue to Saturday and Sunday.
The carnival will see over 70 of the best teams in the state compete for the rights to the best association in Queensland.
Make sure to get down and come and watch our local teams from Cairns, Mareeba and Tablelands competing in the 16 years, 18 years, Open and Masters.
They’re sure to be extremely competitive in a tournament that I expect will feature some high-quality, fast-paced games.
Best of luck to all of the teams competing.