DHC Women's A Report | 2016-2017

“Bedankt iedereen voor een goed seizoen”

​I’d personally like to thank the Dutch Hockey Club for welcoming me into the 2016-2017 Winter Hockey year. As a newbie to Hong Kong, eager to join and play hockey as soon as I arrived, there was no competition. Lisanne, Lisanne, and Marleen (this was very confusing aka De Bie and Elfring) were super efficient in responding to emails, and thus were incredibly welcoming, and were the real reasons that I signed with the Dutch within 5 days of being in Hong Kong.
 
Having trained with two teams in my first week, both at the IRC whilst Valley was being repaired, I can only say “Thank You” to Ali, who made the most of what was a horrible surface (and size) to prepare training drills for our Dutch women and men to make the most of what we had in the beginning of the season. Cheers Ali for your training sessions and strategy, we look forward to another season with you to improve further.
 
My first game in early September, not long after the season had started, I realized what Hockey in Hong Kong was going to be like, HOT. 33°, Sunny & Humid. That first game of the season for me, against Valley B, was dreadful, between the weather and the coach’s seemingly lack of sportsmanship was a shock. But the spirit we did have; we pursued throughout the season and had some fantastic and strong wins.
 
I’d personally like to thank Marleen, the original A Captain, for seeing us through until her departure to Jakarta, to Caroline, Carito, Hannah, Amelie, Dike, Sarie, Rose (& I’m sure others!) who played superb games up for us during the season. A special call out to Dike who was actually 5th equal goal scorer of 1st Division with Flo, and the sadly missed Caroline was 4th! What a great effort by the Dutch this year! Thank you to all of our newbies who joined in the second half, Jenny (can we all learn how you can sprint that fast please, what is the secret?), Thessa (looking forward to more centre action next season!), Marina (bring on the beers & Pub Quiz nights), Sarah N (for returning from knee injury and reinitiating the kitty!). Cheers to the girls from “a million miles away” who brought some serious spirit to the season and some kick ass goal keeping! 
 
But what about the stats? This year the Dutch A, came 3rd in our division, with 8 wins and 2 draws, the second “Goals For” in the division with 30 goals in the season. In the second half, with a long departure of our skillful coach Ali, between Lisanne, Liesbeth and myself, we managed to pull together some superior wins, I believe our Defense improved and we spread the pitch like a Premier Division team.
 
I have probably some of the worst memory, but remember when we played against HKFC C and we won 2-1 (officially), that felt like one of the best games we played all season, and then when we played against them in the second half and lost 0-2 with essentially 9 players (and three Jen’s?!), we played so well as a team!  In 17-18, we should definitely add MVP per match & “Fines” (if you don’t know what this is, I’m sure Sarah can explain! 
 
I’m not really sure how I ended up as team captain after Marleen left, but it was my pleasure to manage such a fun, sociable team. I hope that many of you will return in 17-18 for another season kicking ass in the first division, and enjoying the social aspect of our club. 
 
I look forward to seeing many of you back for the next season, and thank you to all of those who played / filled in for us last season and may be departing us in the coming months.
 
Kelly-Ann
“The Antipodean”  

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