LADIES’ HOCKEY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 21 August 1939, Page 8

LADIES’ HOCKEY

ADVICE TO PLAYERS WAIRARAPA TEAM FOR TOURNAMENT. POLISHED COMBINATION ESSENTIAL. By LES M. MURPHY (Wellington Ladies’ Hockey Critic.) With the close proximity of the Dominion tournament some sound advice on the art of combination to the Wairarapa team is timely and should be beneficial. It gives pleasure to see that Wairarapa will be represented at the New Zealand women’s hockey tournament, opening in Blenheim next Saturday. Another pleasing factor is that the team is being given every opportunity to settle down to a good team understanding and combination. Practice together is the most essential part of the training of any team or representative side. It is: a well-known fact that a team with members of average sporting ability can, with sound combination, outclass a team in which there is a smattering of brilliant players, but a lack of ‘ combination Combination can bolster up many weaknesses in stickwork and soloistic penetration, but no team can be expected to display close co-operative ability unless the players have ample opportunity of playing together, which, I understand, Wairarapa has had. Combination is generally described as the essence of team play. Without it the game is dominated by a series of individual movements. Straggling rushes and disorganised movements characterise it. The players fail to move as one and fail to comprehend each other’s aims. The resultant confusion produces a loss through misdirected energy. There is a lack of cohesion and understanding, and the real significance of the term “team” becomes lost.

Combination can be developed, but it must be built upon individual ability. The greater the individual’s ability with the stick, the more varied her strokes, the better her physical and mental endowments —then the higher will be the standard of combination.

Combination can vary in degree of quality just as an individual’s stroking can vary from a hit to a wide range of effective strokes. That cooperative play can be developed is certain, but it must be understood that the standard will depend on what the player brings into the game. The highest form of combined play is seen where players, by thoughtful practice, can anticipate how various members of the team will react to a situation in the game. Different players have different strokes, and react differently to varying situations. Combination develops as the players learn to follow each other’s play. It is clearly seen that it must constitute an advantage for a right inner to know exactly what her centre will do in a certain phase of the game. Immediately the inner can place herself in the most advantageous position to receive the ball, which practice has taught her will arrive at a certain place at a given time. The rapidity of such a movement—j almost automatic —places the opposition at a disadvantage, and opportunities are opened up. The elements of understanding and anticipation must always be present in any team which displays combination. Not only can it exist between a pair of players, but a whole team can be involved in any movement, the players, as a team, changing their relative positions as the game proceeds, and assuming such positions favourable to the run of play. Combination is developed primarily through practice together, but the process can be quickened by intelligent analysis of each partner’s style of play and favourite strokes.

Study Champion Team. When in Blenheim members of the Wairarapa team will be well advised to'study the combined methods adopted by the champion team, Eastern Southland. The understanding, euse with which movements are carried out. and wonderful positional play, will open young players' eyes. A study of the working of a thoroughly experienced and polished combination as Eastern will be of immense benefit to any player no matter what her position on the field.

' Continued Next Monday.)