Hikers and Old Fort senior teams are on collision course to reach the final following another successful night for the two teams as the GT&T National Indoor Hockey championships continued Tuesday evening at the Cliff Anderson Sports Hall.
Hikers squeezed past Georgetown Cricket Club ‘A’ team 5-4 while Old Fort brushed aside GCC ‘B’ 4-1 in first division matches.
The three clubs shared the honours in the `B’ division with Hikers beating Old Fort 6-1; Old Fort edging out GCC in the under-19 competition 2-1 and GCC Tigers nipping Hikers ladies 3-2.
The much hyped final match of the evening seemed destined to be a one-sided affair after the first five minutes as the Hikers dominated GCC and easily chalked up two goals in the second and third minutes of the match through the nippy Robert France and Captain Devin Munroe.
In the 18th minute, GCC scored when defensive dynamo Dwayne Scott slammed home a penalty corner strike but Hikers responded with a penalty corner of their own.
However, in the final minute of the half, Munroe registered his second goal in an identical manner to Scott’s giving Hikers the 3-1 lead at the half.
The game had balanced itself out in the latter minutes of the first half and the second half seemed to belong to GCC as the Bourda boys registered their second goal through a brilliant Devin Hooper one-handed effort.
Hooper missed a penalty stroke one minute later in an effort to draw his team even but Munroe struck again for Hikers to complete a hat-trick of goals off a penalty corner.
Dwayne Scott and Orland Semple made good on GCC’s efforts to stay in the game as they drove in two more goals from a penalty corner in the 29th minute and a field goal in the 30th respectively to draw the scores even at 4-4.
Just when the game seemed to be ending in a stalemate however, Shane Samuels made a diving steal to hit home the winning goal for Hikers.
In the other `A’ division match, Old Fort ‘A’ were clearly the better of the two sides as they dismissed the GCC’B’ by 4-1.
Askofu Simon led all scorers with a double while team-mates Aderemi Simon and Dwayne Allen scored one goal each.
Shaka Gill was the lone scorer for GCC.
Earlier in the evening, the newly introduced under-19 division saw its first match of the tournament with Old Fort defeating GCC 2-1 in a closely-matched battle.
Kevin Melville and Delon Lewis scored for Old Fort while Stephen Xavier scored GCC’s lone reply.
The Flora GCC Tigers upstaged the Hikers in the ladies match of the night by running away with a 2-0 lead by half time including a goal in the opening 10 seconds of the game.
As GCC eased off the pedal, the Hikers clawed their way back to within one but the game ended at 4-3 in favour of GCC.
Kerensa Fernandes scored a hat-trick for the Tigers while her sister Sonia Jardine nailed the other goal.
Veteran Cora Towler scored a double for the Hikers and Shondell Durant a single.
The Hikers ‘B’ pulled off a resounding 6-1 victory against Old Fort ‘B’ in the lone men’s `B’ division match of the evening.
Robert France led with a hat-trick for the Hikers which was supported by one each from team-mates Kenny Kansinally, Randy Hope and Renick Evelyn.
Jason DeSantos scored the lone goal for Old Fort.
The Hikers and Old Fort teams lead the `A’ division table with six points each while the two GCC teams `A’ and `B’ are yet to earn points.
Hikers, three points, share the lead with Western Dragons in the men’s `B’ Division competition while Old Fort has surged ahead in the under-19 division also with three points.
The Flora GCC Tigers have the runaway lead in the ladies division with six points.
Matches continue this evening starting at 18:00 hours.
Hikers will play Old Fort in an Under-19 fixture, Spartans will do battle with Tigers (ladies), Carib Degenerates will face Hikers in the ‘B’ division, GCC ‘A’ will oppose their ‘B’ team while Old Fort ‘A’ will square off with Hikers ‘A’ in the final match of the night.
