SNP Warrior Shane Hammond is set to pounce on a ball spilled by the Yarra goalkeeper during the State League Three preliminary hockey final on Sunday. Picture: Dave Shipton.FOR the SNP Warriors Hockey Club, four out of five isn’t bad.
On Saturday, the SNP Metro One side played Greensborough for a place in the grand final and was relentless with its attack on the ball, easily winning 7-1.
Progressing to the grand final, the Metro One team will now face Camberwell at 10am on Saturday at Monash University Clayton Campus.
On Sunday the SNP State League Three team played Yarra at the State Netball and Hockey Centre in Melbourne.
Yarra came out with all guns blazing and took the Warriors by surprise and kept them on the back-foot for most of the game.
SNP goalkeeper Michael Shipton was faced with one-on-one and two-on-one battles numerous times, but kept out the relentless attacks on goal for much of the match.
Two slip-ups finally allowed Yarra to score two goals by half-time.
The second half was the same as the first with the Warriors under enormous pressure.
However, a Mark Fernandez goal for SNP against the flow of play let the Warriors back into the match, but it proved to be as close as SNP would get to victory.
For the second week in a row, a yellow card left the Warriors short of one player on the ground, all but ending their chances of scoring an equaliser.
On 16 September, the SNP Warriors juniors set the trend for next year’s season by winning the under 17 Pennant, under 15 Central and under 13 South grand finals. The Warriors under 13 side faced off against Camberwell at Hawthorn.
It was a drawn game at full-time, but the Warriors made best use of the extra time and Luke Cooney scored the winning golden goal.
The undefeated under 15 Xentral team also played at Hawthorn against Doncaster in a nerve-racking finale to the season.
After a 0-0 scoreline at full-time, and after overtime, a penalty shootout began. Matt Goldie hit the winning goal for the Warriors to secure the premiership.
The under 17 Pennant South team played Casey at Clayton in the last of the grand finals.
The Warriors opened the scoring for the game with Ashley Hammond scoring the first goal.
Casey could not score an equaliser, thanks to skilful play from Warriors defensive players Andrew Larman, Jessica Phillips and goalkeeper Shane Ascough.
The Warriors continued to fire on all cylinders in the second half, with another two goals scored by Travis Bone and Katherine Barber.
A 3-0 final score was an easy win for the Warriors to secure the under 17 Pennant South premiership.
