The annual Colombo League Hockey tournament which is organized by the Colombo Hockey Association started off last week at the Colombo Astro turf.
The Colombo Hockey League was inaugurated in the late 1970’s by the co-founders of the Colombo Hockey Association, Mr Walter Jayasooriya and Mr Mahamud, in order to develop hockey in the Colombo district.
In this year’s competition there are twelve Men’s teams competing in the ‘B’ division for the Pioneer Shield and five men’s teams participating in the ‘A’ division for the Andriesz Shield. Further, four women’s teams will be competing for the President’s trophy in this league tournament.
The first match in the Women’s category for the day was between University of Moratuwa and Malay’s Hockey Club. In the first few minutes both teams played very energetically and as time passed Malay’s Hockey Club started changing their game patterns therefore they were able to take the lead by scoring the first goal of the match. The final results showed that Malays Hockey Club won the match by 9-0.
Photos : Colombo League Hockey 2017
In the next match that took place between University of Colombo and University of Jayawardanapura. Both teams displayed very good skills and maintained their university friendships throughout the game and played in a very fair manner. University of Colombo won the match by 2-1.
The game between KDU and the Old President’s Hockey Club was one of the fast and energetic matches in the men’s category and KDU won the match by scoring two goals and keeping Old President’s Hockey Club goalless with a very tight defensive effort.
In the next match Old Royal Hockey Club recorded the highest goal score for the day against University of Moratuwa. Old Royal is one of the leading hockey clubs in the Colombo district and also in the island. Even though, University of Moratuwa attackers tried their best they were unable to overcome the tight defensive strategies that were adopted by Old Royal Hockey Club and the latter won the match by 9-0.
Old Ananda Hockey Club was able to win the match that was played with Old Thomians Hockey Club by 3-0 but at the same time Old Ananda could not win their match against BRC. However, the match that was between BRC and Old Ananda was a very balanced game that had very good attacking and defensive strategies implemented by both teams. The final score was 3-2 which made BRC the winners.
The final match of the day took place between Malays Hockey Club and Old Bens. From the start of the match both teams showed a very aggressive game but Malays Hockey Club took the lead by scoring two goals from the first half. Old Bens Club was able to score three goals. However, the final score was 4-3 which made Malay’s club the winners.
