Hockey: Special Pontifex maintains his goal

MELBOURNE -  Wellington goalkeeper Kyle Pontifex lists Charlton Heston's "from my cold dead hands" as the most inspirational quote he's heard.

It's the attitude he'll no doubt take when, and if, he finally gets his hands on the No 1 goalkeeping spot in the New Zealand men's hockey team.

Since his debut in 2001, Pontifex has less than 30 caps, while Paul Woolford, the current No 1, is nudging 90.

The understudy goalkeeper must be one of the loneliest jobs in the world.

Game after game you sit on the bench knowing only a freak injury or disaster will enable you to add to your meagre cap collection - the sort of things you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy, let alone a team-mate.

It's a kind of netherworld they exist in. They're part of the inner sanctum but are invariably staring in from the outside when the action starts.

"It can be tough at times," the 26-year-old Pontifex admitted on the eve of the Games, at that stage not sure whether he had done enough to oust Woolford from the No 1 spot. "I've been around long enough to know how to deal with it. When you come through the ranks each team normally has two keepers and one will normally play more than the other."

The twin buzzwords of the modern sporting idiom, 'rotation' and 'policy', rarely apply to goalkeepers, whether it's hockey or football.

"It's not like the outfield, either, where you're subbed on and off pretty regularly. As a rule you want your No 1 keeper playing most of the time."

Which makes you wonder whether, even if it's just a stolen moment or two, Pontifex ever wishes Woolford would make the odd, how shall we say it, cock-up or two?

"Nah. You don't ever want to see that happen," he said earnestly enough to convince Thomas and his fellow doubters.

It's easy to be sceptical though.

Speaking to the Herald on Sunday, perennial bench-warmer Norm Hewitt said there was many a time he wished ill on Sean Fitzpatrick, the brick wall that blocked his path to the All Black No 2 guernsey.

"I used to think, 'I wonder if I could break his leg at training today'," Hewitt said. "I'd question what I was even doing there, spending so much time when I knew I wouldn't get to play. The answer always came back to, 'What would I rather be doing, sitting on the bench for the All Blacks or sitting at home watching it on TV?' The answer was always the same."

What Pontifex and Hewitt agree on is that the desperation to prove yourself acts as a spur. "The way I think about it is that if I want to be the regular No 1 keeper, then I have to raise my game to a whole new level. I cannot wait or expect Paul to drop his standards," Pontifex said.

Hewitt's frustrations manifested themselves in a ferocious attitude towards training.

"The only way I could prove that I was good enough to be there was to show how committed I was. I never bitched and moaned. I just worked harder."

Hewitt, towards the end of his career anyway, at least had the comfort of being well paid for his troubles.

Pontifex faces an entirely different set of challenges. He works fulltime for the National Bank in IT support and relies on the benevolence of his employer to take time off and temporarily relocate to Auckland when the Black Sticks are in camp.

"That can be extremely tough," Pontifex said of the work-sport balance. "Ask any non-paid athlete and they'll say the same - it's incredibly tough."

He said this with such a sunny disposition that it is difficult to believe Pontifex, for all the struggles, would want to be doing anything else.

And he doesn't.

He's fully committed to being the best goalkeeper he possibly can. When that happens he wants it to mean he is the best goalkeeper in the world. From his cold dead hands and all that.

He's constantly looking "for an edge" in his training. While many goalkeepers have a well-earned reputation for eccentricity, Pontifex finds nothing strange about taking up juggling - both feet and hands - to improve his footwork and reflexes.

Hewitt believes the spin-offs of a life spent waiting are mostly beneficial.

"I found it helped me become more resilient in other aspects of my life."

Good things, it would appear, come to those who wait.
 
- HERALD ON SUNDAY