Leicester Hockey Club

Leicester has qualified for next weekend's National Championships to be held at Trent FM Arena in Nottingham. Going into the final League weekend in Croydon, Leicester lay second in the table behind Slough, a seriously depleted squad having performed superbly before Christmas to win three of four games played. Leicester was able to welcome back several players who had missed out previously when Leicester supplied 7 players for the Great Britain Test series in Argentina. Chloe Rogers and Beckie Herbert, in particular, were strong inclusions having made a major contribution to England's European Challenge triumph a week ago in Rouen, France.

Leicester began against Olton on Saturday. Olton took the lead but Leicester hit back through Kerry Williams, another from England's squad from Rouen. A double from Rogers, two from Lauren Turner and goals from Lucy Brown and GB player Katie Long saw Leicester to a  7-4 win. Next up was Bowdon Hightown, last year's champion side. It took until the 17th minute before Brown broke the deadlock and then goals from Rogers, Herbert and Long and a second from Brown gave Leicester a 5-3 win.

Leicester's last match on Saturday was against League leaders Slough. In a very closely fought game Slough took a 2-0 lead in controversial fashion, both goals being contested by Leicester. Leicester could not recover from the deficit, losing 3-1 with Herbert notching the goal.

At 9 am on Sunday morning, with qualification a certainty barring a double figures loss to Chelmsford, Leicester lost 3-1 to Chelmsford. Coach Andy Fairbrother said: "We played badly against Chelmsford but the key thing is that we have qualified for the finals weekend. The loss to Slough was disappointing because the umpires got things wrong which they apologised for after the game."

Next Saturday in Nottingham Leicester will face Canterbury who won all 7 of their matches after an opening heavy defeat to Leicester before Christmas. Should they win they will face the winner of Slough v Bowdon on Sunday in a match that will be amongst a package televised by Sky.

Outdoors last weekend the 3rds maintained their promotion push in Leicestershire Premier with a 4-0 win against Loughborough Students 5ths that should have seen more Leicester goals. Sandy Yeates set the ball rolling with other first half goals coming from Laura Yell and Abi Lester. Becky Hutchinson's goal was all Leicester had to show for a dominant second half showing. 

Leicester 4ths faced the Students' 4ths and lost 3-0. The game's turning point came when a perfectly good Leicester equaliser by Jo Wyeth was ruled out.

Leicester 5ths produced the result of the weekend beating Charnwood-Sileby 8-2. Missing most of the side's experienced players the youngsters went 2-0 up through Phil Bliss and Ruth Williams before Rosie Hampton made it 3. A second half brace from Freya Tailor, a second for Williams and goals for Ashleigh Goodenough and player coach Gaynor Nash made it 8.