DML Sports & Social Primary 6-aside Mixed Hockey Festival
5th June 2003

Report by Jamie Oxley
Photos by David Crispin. Click on the photos to view a larger copy.

Held at the College of St Mark & St John on Thursday 5th June.

This years primary mixed hockey festival held at Marjon on Thursday was a huge success. The event, which only started last year, is proving even more popular with primary schools in the City and local area.

England and GB hockey star Denise Marston-Smith was the special guest at the festival. Denise was delighted to be able to support the event and was impressed with the standard of play and the magnitude of the festival.

The daylong event in which 25 schools, 32 teams, and over 300 young players attended, all but 3 teams were from Plymouth. In the morning while the pool stages of the event took place Denise conducted mini skills coaching sessions, which proved very popular.

Along with the coaching an individual hockey juggling competition took place. Katie Glasspoole (Woodford Primary) and Lauren Hutchings (Bovey Tracey Primary) were joint winners with a score of 126. Gemma Glaysher(North Prospect) was the runner up with 113. In the boys competition Liam Wakefield(574) and Daniel Green (349) were 1st and 2nd. Joe Jordan (St Budeaux) came 3rd scoring 256. The winners and runners up won prizes donated by Fitness for Sport, Chetwynd Sports of North Hill and Tony Pryce Sports.

In the morning twenty 14 to 17 years olds from schools in Plymouth, Tavistock and Ivybridge conducted their foundation umpires award under the guidance of Tina Phillips. Linking to the festival the foundation umpires put theory in to practice umpiring the pool stages.

Before commencing with the knockout stages of the competitions a big schools skills competition took place, which was sponsored by Shobrook and Co. The winners were Bovey Tracey and the runners up were St Peter RC.

Two competitions were run; in the Mixed Hockey Shield Austin Farm beat St Paul’s in their semi final while Woodford defeated Southway. In a tight final Austin Farm beat Woodford on Penalties 1-0. Patrick Wilson was Denise’s player of the match winning an England Hockey Cap. St Paul’s defeated South 2-1 to finish in third place.

In the OPM Cup final Bovey Tracey defeated last years winners Oreston 2-1 while Ermington beat Plymouth College Prep 2-0 in their respective semi final. In a highly entertaining final between Ermington and Bovey, Liam Wakefield was voted player of the Cup receiving a GB hockey shirt from Denise. Bovey Tracey scored two late goals to win 4-2 to become the second winners of the OPM Cup presented by Jason Sweby 1st team captain. Liam Wakefield is certainly one player to watch for the future with real determination and skill.

Festival organiser Jamie Oxley described the event as a huge success thanking all the volunteer students from Marjon who helped organise and run the event, and development group sponsors DML Sports & Social, Shobrook & Co, Kelly College and Marjon Sports & Leisure for supporting the festival.

Oxley praised the support given to the schools hockey development programme by Marjon students, particularly Simon Fenwick.

The photos are: