CLUB matches across the Goulburn Valley Hockey Association have taken the sideline over the past six weeks as three very important Hockey Victoria State Championships have been run.

Euroa had representatives at all three – the Victorian Junior Country Championships (JCC), the Victorian Senior Country Championships (SCC) and the Victorian Grassroots Junior State Championship (JSC) all held in Melbourne.

JCC sees association representative teams from right across regional Victoria come together to play full field, 11 a side hockey in Under 13, 15 and 18 age categories with a separate boys and girls championship being played in each.

Games were played over two days and involved initial round robins then cross-over finals.

The Under 13 Championships were played at Essendon Hockey Club.

Local player Aidan Hamill was selected in the GVHA Under 13 Boys Team and Kim Hamill was their manager.

This team were right up there till the end playing lots of exciting hockey and developing as a team and individually across the two days.

Stella Keramaris, Abbie Thannhauser and Lume Magro played in the GVHA Under 13 Girls team with Chris Chittick coaching.

With the girls going into this competition with only a few players familiar with the 11 a side format, most having only played seven aside or the new five aside version of the game, it was always going to be on a steep learning curve.

However, they took on the challenge, tried new position and improved with every game finishing the weekend with an exciting and hard-fought draw against West Gippsland.

Unfortunately, Lume felt ill during the first game and while she bravely finished it her symptoms became worse, and she was unable to take any further part.

Joel Hamill was selected in the GVHA Under 15 Boys team and played his championship at Greensborough Hockey Club.

His team was also competitive right through most of the weekend.

All players were well supported by the association, extended families and club mates.

Lots of new friendships were also made.

SCC was played at Hawthorn Hockey Centre over the King's Birthday weekend.

While no current Euroa members played in this event this year Chris Chittick did some work on the tech bench and former member James Black played for GVHA in the A Grade Men’s competition.

JSC is the next step up with teams representing one of nine zones across the state playing each other.

Three of these zones are from regional Victoria and this year GVHA players trialed for a place in the Northwest Lightning Zone which extends from Mansfield across to Bendigo and up through Kerang and the Wimmera to Mildura (Sunraysia).

This is a large zone, so selection was no certainty so Joel Hamill being selected in the Under 16 Boys team and Aidan Hamill in the second Under 12 Hockey 5s team is to be congratulated.

Kim Hamill also stepped up to manage the Under 12 Boys team.

The competitions were run in Melbourne across the first Thursday and Friday of the school holidays as well as the weekend.

Games were played at Footscray Hockey Club and the State Hockey Centre in Parkville.

Under 14 and 16 separate boys' and girls' championships were played over the full four days and was 11 a side.

The first two days were pooled round robins and then day three and four led into cross over finals.

Under 12s played the first ever State Championships in Hockey 5s that is fully enclosed, fast paced and high scoring. As this format is shorter games it was played over the two days of the weekend again as two pools round robins finishing with finals.

At the end of their championships both boys had had a good tournament, found the back of the net and went home, understandably, very tired.

Aidan was awarded Player’s Player for his team and was also sixth highest goal scorer in his championship.

Lume Magro, who only took up goalkeeping this year didn’t know about the Lightning selections until it was too late.

However, goalkeepers tend to be rare, in juniors in particular, so she was picked up by the Southwest Country Eagle Zone to play in their Under 12 Girls Hockey 5s team. Being gigh scoring Hockey 5s goalkeepers are encouraged to look more at the number of shots on goal blocked than the score.

Lume certainly won the admiration of her teammates and spectators with stats showing that she stopped over 280 shots over the two days - far more than went past. Understandably she too travelled home tired.

Back to Club Hockey in the GVHA – now the school holidays and rep hockey are almost over attention returns to the GVHA Interclub competitions.

Euroa’s Under 10s and B Women’s teams are looking forward to getting back to some regular club hockey and hopefully some training on the Friendlies Oval if the weather starts holding on Monday nights.