Proud young wahine represent Taitokerau

Kia ora.  I write to thank you on behalf of the Northland U13 Girls Collier Hockey Development team for Te Rūnanga-A-Iwi O Ngāpuhi sponsorship funding.  You helped make it possible for these young girls to travel to Rotorua on 5-7 October 2017 to represent Taitokerau. After three long days of games I am delighted to inform you that we came home with the trophy although we do have to share it with Canterbury. The girls won all their games in the pool play and were up against Canterbury, in the North Island vs South Island final. It was a highly contested game and after 50 minutes of play the final whistle went and the score was nil all.  Both teams gave it everything. Canterbury gave it their all on attack but just couldn’t get it past Northlands strong defence. It was decided by the girls that they would like to go into overtime and see if a winner could be determined that way but even after two 5-minute periods of extra time with player drop offs, the teams could still not be separated. In the end both teams were happy to call it a 1st all draw and share the trophy. We once again thank you kindly from the bottom of our hearts for your awhi.”

Evania Laybourn (Team Manager and 16 very proud young wahine.)

[Published in E Mara E-Pānui 26 October 2017]