Round 2: Home Teams Secure Their Wins

It was another exciting weekend filled with four closely contested matches. All four home teams took the winning points, with both the Women’s and Men’s Falcons teams winning in Napier and both the Women’s and Men’s Alpiner’s teams winning in Christchurch.

The Women’s Falcons narrowly defeated the Tridents 2-1 in a penalty shootout after a 5-5 draw. The Falcons seemed to have the game in hand until late goals from the Tridents' Petrea Webster and Holly Pearson forced a shootout.

The Men's Falcons and Tridents played to a 4-4 draw before the Tridents clinched the win 5-3 in a penalty shootout. A memorable moment of the match came when Matthew Wilson lobbed the ball from just outside the halfway line and found Dylan Thomas, who calmly guided the ball past the keeper to score. Despite the close match, the Falcons came out with the win.

Down in Christchurch, the Women’s Alpiners faced the Mavericks. Despite numerous circle entries, they struggled to convert, resulting in a 1-1 draw and leading to a shootout, where they managed to clinch the win.

The final game of the weekend was between the Alpiners and Mavericks Men. It was a slow start on the goal-scoring front but George Baker broke the seal and it was all on from there with the Mavericks responding five minutes later with a powerful penalty corner strike from Luke Aldred. The Alpiners quickly gained control with a swift counterattack by Sam Lane & Nick Findlay and a penalty corner to follow which was converted by Sam Lane to finalise their win.