- 5 Dads,

- 5 Sons

- 4 University students, (2 sons)

- 5 Adult players from the Summer Master’s team

- 1 Daughter Manager

- 17 to 64   AVERAGE age about 38

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At the end of last season, the team was not sure about the players returning, nor the selection process around the grade.

Last year Lads and Dads along with Team Yellow secured two teams for the new format Division 2 Men’s competition. It was thought the team may have to play in division 3 to keep the team together.

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Trials came and went and most of the players had registered, minus a couple of the boys who had hopes of higher honours.

 

After some discussion with some of the key players, it was decided to give the Division 2 competition another crack knowing the competition was now going to be tougher. The club supported the request to keep the team together so there was some pressure to obtain a good result. After losing a couple of youth players, we recruited Graham Wessels into the team.

The season started with a Derby game against yellow which resulted in a draw with a same result later in the season. The rest of the season went well with a couple of losses and draws along the way. The team had a last-ditch chance to win the Championship but that day we were down some of our key players and the 7 goals necessary to win overall was out of reach.

Finally finishing a clear second in the Championship, we moved on to the final’s day rounds where we met Poppadom’s in the semi-final. Feeling confident since recently beating them a couple weeks earlier, we did not play our best game and ended up with a loss, thus ending our run for a final’s day game. You learn the hard way with one poor performance; the season is over. We can gloat that we actually beat the eventual winner ECB (DOG DEN) in the round robin games.

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Our best hockey was played against the eventual winners where we would pass the ball into space and down the edges. Refraining from hitting long and hard. Defending like demons. This was great hockey. The defensive effort of the team kept the team in touch all season, making it hard for other teams to beat us. Our challenge all season was scoring goals based on the amount of possession that we had all season. This is still a work in progress for 2025 SEASON.​

 

Not sure on the 2025 season but looks like the team will have another go providing we can keep the support of our university boys. In the meantime, the DADS will play in the Summer Masters.

 

When the team came together in 2023, the idea was to have the LADS and DADS on the turf and to enjoy the experience with friends and family. The objective was to win but not at the expense of fun and enjoying the game of hockey together. This year as a team, we covered the team objectives and nearly reached the moon with success.

 

Special thanks to:

Our Regular call up subs          Noel Hensman

                                                    Manroopak Singh (Bal)

 

Both players contributed well to our overall performance, and we’d like to thank them for turning up at short notice.

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To our Supporters, Mums, Dads, Daughters, Grand Parents, Girlfriends and hangers on,  thank you for all your support and words of encouragement.

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Some stats:

A          Second in the round robin competition

B          Third Equal as of finals day

 

Aaron Croll, 16 goals.

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2023 Season Round Up

 

The 2023 season started with a group of fathers who played Summer Master’s hockey for the first time. This inspired the idea to assemble a team of Fathers and Sons. Richard Van Der Vegte championed the idea with the club, and the Lads and Dads team was formed.

 

The team consisted of:

18 Regular players

1 Casual player

- 7 Dads,

- 5 Secondary school player,

- 4 University students,

- 2 Adult players from the Summer Master’s team

- 1 Casual son player

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The first game against Poppadoms was interesting, especially for the lads who had come to division two to play with their dads and were not expecting the division to be as competitive as it was, as we lost 7-1. Our next game against Tigers was not much better as we again lost, and we were now at the bottom of the table and left re-evaluating ourselves.

 

Fortunately, the team had a turnaround after this rocky start, and we began climbing up the table due to significant reshuffling of the positions to pull the rabbit out of the hat and ultimately finish the season second equal and being the lead ABC team for the competition.

 

Unfortunately, the playoffs didn’t quite live up to our hype as we started it off by drawing with ABC Yellow, following it up with two losses, putting us face to face with Takapuna Black and facing relegation to (new) Division 3 for 2024. However, the Lads and Dads did pull through, and we did have a convincing 7- 0 win against Takapuna. Putting us in the plate finals, where all 18 of us came to play, resulting in us bringing in an extra goalie to have a card of 18 players. This ultimately didn’t help, as we lost 4-2 despite being up 2-0 at the end of the first quarter.

 

The season was very different from other teams, given the family connections, but overall, it was fun for all. Attendance at training was pretty good overall, given most of the team had other activities and situations to deal with. We handed out the POTD award (almost) every week whilst trying to find the knob of the day. We found that a different player had stepped up and got the POTD award each week.

 

In the eyes of some, you could say we underperformed given the strength of the lads as we had two lads in the North Harbour under 18s and two in the under 16s, as well as a handful of very good university students, one of which may even have secured the golden stick award as he scored 20 goals. However, we successfully secured second equal in the round robin, a second team for ABC in the division two competition for 2024 and played on finals day.

 

Overall, the team has improved, and while some of the younger players still want to run too far with the ball and, from a coaching perspective, is still a work in progress. I’m sure the team will be stronger next year as both the Lads and Dads have improved over the season, and we do expect a good number of the players to return next year, depending on the club’s selection policy for division two.

 

Special thanks to Emily Whitby, our manager, who navigated the PlayHQ app, got our game day

subbing bench in order, and ensured we had our sugar intake at ½ time with our sweets. She kept everyone in check, including the coach, and ensured everyone had good game time.

 

Roll on 2024!