Tag Archive for: sports

Junior Girls’ Hockey Win League Decider

Congratulations to the Junior Girls’ Hockey XI who last week won their league final in emphatic fashion, with a 3-0 win over Santa Sabina at Three Rock Rover HC. The match’s first goal came one minute before halftime, Rachel Pollock choosing the perfect time to score, and it served to settle the team’s nerves. They came out much more confident in the second half, playing more fluidly with linking passes resulting in a quick second goal for Rachel. Santa Sabina continued to fight to the end; still, with the St. Columba’s team growing in confidence and the defensive line pushing up to the halfway line putting the Santa Sabina midfield & defence under a lot of pressure, the third goal came ensuring the win. That third goal completed a superb hat trick for Rachel Pollock. The team celebrated and so they should; it was a fantastic team performance and they thoroughly deserved their win.
Team:
S. Walker
S. Pollock
R. Pollock
G. McCarthy
A. McCarthy
D. Murray
T. Larke
P. Pringle
C. Penwill
S. Dobbs
H. Moffett
H. Robertson
D. Brady
G. Trolese
N. Bradley Brady
Coach: Stef Haughton
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Sebastian Dijkstra – An Update from Glenwood High School, Durban

Sebastian Dijkstra, a pupil in Form IV, is spending his Transition Year at Glenwood High School in Durban with the aim of improving his cricket and expanding his horizons. He sends a report from South Africa on how his year has been going so far.

The journey began on the 8th of January in Terminal 2, Dublin Airport. After arriving at the terminal, I first met Senan Reid from Clontarf CC who was going to Muir College in the Eastern Cape. Then at 10 pm, we boarded the plane off to Dubai. We were lucky enough to be travelling with the Irish men’s cricket team on their way to Harare to play against Zimbabwe. A couple of the players went to South Africa during their TY year and it was nice to get some feedback from their experience.

Eventually, after 20 hours of travelling, we landed in Durban. Two days after we arrived, we met the head of cricket at Glenwood, Mr Bux, and Mr Duncan, the head of Gibson House. Mr Duncan gave us a tour of the school and where I would be staying. The next day was the annual pre-term High-Performance Camp. It was an immense change training in 30-degree heat after just coming out of winter. HP camp started with a team meeting inside along with a presentation and what we would focus on throughout the day. Then outside, we took part in specific fielding drills, along with target bowling and batting drills. After four days of intense training, school had begun.

On the first day of school, I had a session with Ben, the first team Biokineticist, as I was recovering from a broken arm. Later on in the day, I had my first u16A training session.  The first few training sessions consisted of technique and fitness. Unfortunately for the first week, I was only allowed to do recovery in the gym along with lighter cricket training as my arm was still weak. Ben was a significant help as he set me up with a full rehabilitation plan. Towards the end of the second week, I had my first full, intense training session. Not long after, I played my first match against Kearsney. We bowled first restricting Kearsney to under 250. We then fell a few runs short after accurate bowling from Kearsney.

The following week saw the launch of the academy. This involved training sessions from 7 to 8:15 am every Tuesday and Thursday. Along with that, Mr Bux organised the U16A’s to use the nets from 6 am each day where we could focus on our technique. It also allowed us to hit 300 extra balls each week which grew our confidence leading up to Saturday. Throughout the week, we completed target bowling, flat catching along with boundary work, as well as a net session on the square. This expanded my knowledge of the Durban pitches which helped me to adjust my game. On Friday, our rest day, Mr Bux organised all the ‘A’ squads to go to the new SA 20 competition at Kingsmead stadium.  We watched the Durban ‘Super Giants’ play against the ‘Sunrisers’ Eastern Cape. This was a great opportunity to watch first-class cricket at the top level especially before our game the next day. On Saturday we played Clifton at Delta Cricket Club, a premiere league ground. After a full effort from the team, Clifton, unfortunately, came away with the win. However, with a 100-ball game on Thursday and a 50 over game against Maritzburg College, we have a chance to redeem ourselves.

I would like to thank Cricket Leinster and Glenwood High School for making this trip possible and I am looking forward to the weeks ahead.

Sebastian Dijkstra, St Columba’s College & Merrion CC

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Half Term Sports Update

Sport plays such an important part in the lives of Columbans, with six days of organised games each week. The traditional College winter sports, rugby and hockey, are complimented by a vibrant basketball programme, a growing archery tradition, the thrills of polocrosse (think lacrosse on horseback) and, this year, a brilliant golf academy.

The Golf Academy, eight weeks in, is already an undoubted success. Twelve young golfers, pictured above, have been given the opportunity to practice or play golf every day. A new driving and pitching range is planned (this term, the cricket pitch has been transformed) and a new indoor golf studio will begin construction soon. Of course, all our pupils have access to the College golf course, which provides a tricky challenge for any golfer. The young golfers are showing amazing progress already, under the watchful eye of our new golf professional Josh Adams PGA. For more information on the Golf Academy click here or follow their progress on Instagram.

Archery has been a sport which attracts those with a keen eye and a competitive edge. These past few weeks have been fantastic in terms of weather, making for great practice sessions. The team has welcomed new archers, and all are progressing very well. Senior archers have worked especially on their posture by shooting blindfolded, which they enjoyed very much indeed! We look forward to honing their skills further, with the help of Madame de Fréin.

Rugby is off to a good start this year with the Seniors competing for the newly established Ian McKinley Cup, in a new format which brings together 7 of our traditional rival schools to compete in a league format. We have played 4 league games and have taken maximum points with good wins over Templeogue, Newpark, De la Salle and, this week, St. Benildus. The Juniors have also got off to a very good start to their league campaign with four wins from five games, including a thrilling 31-30 victory over Sandford Park having come back from 20-5 down at halftime.
It’s been a great term so far for girls’ basketball with some excellent performances from the Senior A and Cadette A teams against Kings Hospital, High School, Sancta Maria and Beaufort. The Senior Girls now qualify for the regional playoffs while the Cadette narrowly lost out on a spot. The Senior B girls’ team played four very competitive games and have shown great improvement over the past few weeks. The Senior Boys’ squads have trained consistently and produced excellent performances recently against Woodbrook College and St. Killian’s, CS. Unfortunately, they did not qualify for the playoffs but will compete in the Plate Competitions after the half-term.
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Half Term Sports Update

It has been wonderful to see the full sports programme return this term, with the necessary regulations being followed carefully to ensure a safe yet enjoyable experience for players and coaches. It’s been an extremely busy eight weeks for our young athletes. The full games programme is now up and running with daily training for the traditional College sports (rugby, hockey, basketball) being supplemented by our excellent AGC (Athletic Gymnastic Conditioning) programme, tennis, polocrosse and golf.

In hockey, the red, white and green jerseys are back on the field with over 40 competitive girls hockey fixtures completed already. It’s been similar number of fixtures in the boys game, with plenty of potential from all our young athletes. The senior boys were unlucky to lose their All Ireland qualifier recently to Newpark Comprehensive. They battled back to score at the death, forcing a shoot out, but narrowly lost. Many congratulations to Form III pupil Harry St. Leger who captained the Leinster Under 16 squad during their inter-provincial series. The basketball season took a little longer to get going, but training did take place in the September sunshine before going indoors when the restrictions allowed. There have been a number of friendly fixtures played to date with competitive league games beginning after half term. In rugby, the senior squad have had a good start to the season with convincing wins over De La Salle and St Conleth’s and a close loss to Templeogue College. The senior development side played a very competitive fixture against Clongowes earlier this week but came out second best to a well drilled side. The junior squad are off to a dream start with three wins from three and are showing amazing potential. The Form I and II boys have played some very good matches against De La Salle and Mount Temple also and will look forward to more games after half term. More individual honours: congratulations to Form V pupil Tom Larke, he has been selected to represent the Ireland Under 18 club team against their Italian counterparts (in Italy) over half term.

Experienced horse riders have been the opportunity to play polocrosse (a mixture of polo and lacrosse) and the fine autumnal weather has provided plenty of opportunity to play tennis and golf (on our excellent and challenging nine hole golf course). There are some exciting developments being announced soon about our golf programme – stay tuned!

The best place to find details on our sports fixtures, and their results, can be found on our Twitter feed.

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Run til the Sun – A Challenge to Combat Cancer

The College is delighted to announce details of a fantastic charitable event taking place this April – Run til the Sun! On Saturday, April 25th, Old Columban Alex Panayotou – an accomplished long-distance runner – will challenge herself to run for 24 hours around the College campus. She is looking for your support along the way – both financial and physical – to complete this mammoth challenge.

The event is being organised by a committee of pupils, who have decided that all proceeds from the event should go to Purple House Cancer Support – a fantastic charitable organisation based in Bray that provide hands-on practical support for children and teenagers with cancer. They have set up a fundraising page here where all donations, large and small, will be gratefully received.

You will soon be able to sign up to join Alex on a leg of her journey; perhaps you’re willing to run for a half-hour, 10 kilometres or even something more ambitious? You can run in the morning, afternoon, evening or even at night time – with the course illuminated along the way. The event will culminate with a celebratory barbeque at the Cricket Pavillion on Sunday evening.

The pupils have created a dedicated page for the event here and a donations page here. They have a fundraising target of €8000, which would be transformational for Purple House, as the vast majority of their funding is through donations. We were delighted to welcome Purple House to the College Chapel last Monday to hear about the work they did and some of the organising committee visited their facility in Bray a few weeks ago. Alex is a cancer survivor, another reason why the charity resonated with the pupils.

So please do get involved, donate to the cause, sponsor a runner or run a leg of the journey yourself. We would love the whole community to get involved – pupils, staff, parents, Old Columbans, friends of the College and even local primary schools.

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