Hockey: Old Girls take the title

Old Girls capped off another great year with a Northland Premier Women's title but a late Hikurangi goal had the side sweating in the final five minutes of the game.

A well planned penalty corner mesmerised the Hikurangi defence after 10 minutes with the ball finally deflected in by young Anna Polovnikov to get the favourites off to a perfect start. Less than five minutes later Jess McAlister doubled their lead but Old Girls were unable to kill the game off and Hikurangi slowly began to get back into the match.

They managed to control possession better and curbed the threat posed by Laura Douglas playing high. Early in the second spell they began to create some good chances in Old Girls' circle. But just when time seemed to be against them, Dene Cheeseman struck six minutes from full-time to set up a frantic finale.

Old Girls' coach Alan Lints said Old Girls' inability to score a third goal nearly cost them dearly.

"It was a bit of a coach's nightmare - you're up 2-0 and you're expecting that third goal to come and finish things off but it never came and Hika found themselves in a good position with five minutes to go and they put us under pressure," he said.

He believed his team were the better side on the night but Hikurangi hung tough to stay in the game.

Lints had worried the wily Hikurangi side had planned an effective strategy for the final and so he had sought to come up with something new for the final.

"We thought we'd become too predictable in the way we played, so we decided to give [former Black Stick] Laura [Douglas] free rein to roam forward from her usual right midfield position and put pressure on the defence," the coach said.

In the first spell it proved an effective ploy with Douglas finding plenty of space before the Hikurangi team adapted to the danger.

Hikurangi coach Meredith McInnes was pleased with the way her side had fought back after a poor start.

"The first 10 or 15 minutes or so they had it over us but I think we did well to slowly get back into the game."

In the earlier match for third and fourth place, Maungakaramea recovered from going one down to take out the game 4-1 against the runner-up in the round robin competition Springfield.