COASTAL Pirates once again finished on top, but they were not as dominant as in the past at the Theo’s Superspar Inline Hockey Championships hosted at the Kamikaze rink in Olympia over the weekend.
Pirates’ recent dominance was underlined when they won eight of the 10 divisions at the corresponding Inline Championships last year, but this time they could only manage to win five of the 10 titles on offer.
While all the categories provided top class action, some teams deserve special mention for the results that they achieved.
The u8 Kamikaze team, who came into the tournament seeded fourth, surprisingly beat the top seeded Cazadores in the first round to proceed to the final where they came up against Coastal Pirates. In another action packed match, Kamikaze came out on top with a 3-1 victory to win the gold medal. With parents and supporters cheering on their little ones, this was most certainly one of most vibrant games of the tournament.
Another junior team that had the crowds cheering was the u10 champions, Scorpions. They lived up to their billing as the top seeds when they comfortably beat Kamikaze in the opening round and then beat Pirates 4-3 in a thrilling final to win the gold medal.
The new u16 champions, Badgers, also did exceptionally well. They entered the tournament as the second seeds and ended up beating the top seeded Coastal Pirates 2-1 in an exciting final.
Badgers entered the final as the underdogs, especially since they didnt have enough substitutes on the bench, but they displayed great skills and stamina to clinch the cup from Pirates.
The u18 division provided fast, adrenalin-packed games with Coastal Pirates taking the title with a close 3-2 victory against the top-seeded Badgers in the final.
The Women’s Masters teams Kamikaze and Coastal Pirates, being the only two teams in the finals, had to fight it out amongst each other over two games, both of which were close encounters that ended in favour of Kamikaze.
A further shuffle occurred in the Seniors division, where third-seeded Badgers surprised by winning the gold medal. They comfortably beat Kamikaze in the first round and then won the gold medal after beating Coastal Pirates 1-0 in the final.
On average, matches ended up with a one-goal difference, with teams giving nothing away to their opponents during the competition. Only two matches ended in draws and proceeded to extra time and golden goals, while the referee crew attended well to their task and no major issues or penalties were called.
The Namibia Ice and Inline Hockey Association (Niiha) expressed satisfaction with the concluded season, saying that the standard of play and skills were improving all the time. The executive committee also expressed its gratitude to the players, coaches, sponsors and supporters for making sure that the sport was growing in Namibia.
“We are looking forward to the national trials at the end of November, to select national and federation teams to represent Namibia at international events in the United States and Spain next year,” it added.
