2 OUT OF THREE FOR THE SENIORS

The Ely Senior team travelled to Houghton Regus in Hertfordshire for their latest tournament. This was a new venue for all of the team.
 
The day started with a match against Letchworth. The game got off to a scrappy start with two different styles of play, Letchworth were very good at passing the ball but rarely threatened early on whereas Ely’s more direct approach often broke down once in the opposition half. This lead to a very tight match with very little separating the two sides until well into the second half although Ely had James Bayes to thank in goal for some great saves.  A series of blue cards and tiring legs seemed to change things late on. It was during the second power play with Ely down to three on the rink following a 2 minute ‘sin bin’ and the score at 4 -4 that the match started to swing with Ely scoring two unlikely goals. Once Ely were back to four players they dominated the last few minutes to finish 8 – 4 victors (scorers Rob Gillett 5, Dan Salisbury 2 & Michael Hart).
 
The second match was against the England Ladies team. Ely started to play better although the Ladies defended well early on. Dan Salisbury was having a good game and his speed created a lot of the chances for which he was rewarded with 4 good goals. The remainder of the team all got on the score sheet with goals for James Cox, Sam Arnold, Hart and two for Gillett. The score ended 9 – 2 to Ely with Hannah Barrow from the Ely club scoring one of the England goals.
 
In the final match Ely took on Houghton Regus a very experienced and strong team. They had already beaten Letchworth 14 – 1 and the ladies 9 – 1 so Ely knew the game would not be easy. Houghton got off to a good start with a couple of quick goals, Ely struggled to find any consistency against a style of play they were not used to, the score ending a disappointing  19 – 0. In the other game the Ladies beat Letchworth 5 – 4.