David Grant and Joel Thetford at the BOA Junior National Championships

David Grant and Joel Thetford played for Xarifa under 16 team

David Grant and Joel Thetford, Rochdale Underwater Hockey Club members, joined the ranks of the Xarifa U16 team, playing their first match against TSW U18 (who were destined to go on and win the tournament), which proved to be heavy one way traffic and ended with a score of 9-0.

Next came Guildford U16 who were again a slightly more powerful side and although there were two close opportunities to score the Xarifa team were unable to finish it off due to good defending. Final score was 3-0.

Xarifa U18 came next and goals against steadily mounted up, although there was some hard defending under pressure, the U18s power attacks broke through in the end to leave them winning 6-0.

The next match followed immediately, with no time to rest, against Orkney U16 who normally field very good teams. There were some long rallies and Orkney’s first goal took four minutes. At 3-0 down a concerted attack by Xarifa resulted in their first goal of the tournament but Orkney were able to finish it off at 4-1.

This was followed by Pembroke U16, who won 5-2, TSW U16, a 3-2 win against York U16 and a commanding 8-0 win against Batley U16.

The play-off match was against Guildford U16 who won 3-0 putting Xafira into sixth position overall.