Hockey tourney rolls into town

INLINE hockey players descended on the city over the Labour Day long weekend for the Bendigo Cup.

Held at The Zone in East Bendigo, the comp ran from Wednesday, 8 to Monday, 13 March, and saw teams from most states take part with player numbers double on last year.

“When we first started it was us two and it was two days, last year it was three, and this year it’s six days of hockey,” said organiser and player Peter King.

“We’ve got clubs from Tasmania, Queensland, New South Wales, and SA all here.”

King said organisers are looking to branch out again next year to potentially include teams from Western Australia and New Zealand.

The Bendigo Cup is a feeder competition for selection into the national team, the Aussie Roos.

That squad will travel to America in July for the State Wars tournament, which involves about 300 teams from 11 countries and is set for Indiana.

“With the level of the Senior 1s, we’ve got guys who play in pro leagues playing, we have a referee who’s the head ref of Italy over, so it’s dragging international exposure too,” said Mr King.

Bendigo player Darci Fitzpatrick currently gears up for the local division three Blaze 2 team and the women’s Blaze 1 team, and won Silver in the senior’s comp at the Bendigo Cup.

She said the Cup is “bigger than you’d expect for Bendigo.”

Eighteen-year-old Fitzpatrick has played internationally and said her goal for this season is “just trying to get better in general.”