In a bid to help promote and develop hockey for school children, the Royal Selangor Club hockey section conducted a community hockey development programme for 3 tamil schools in Karak last Saturday 21st May 2011. The programme, a tie-up between RSC hockey section and CIMB Community Link, sees young school going kids (U-12) being taught the basics of the game of hockey. The initiator, Rotary Club Bentong approached CIMB Community Link for funding to conduct a development programme of this nature and since RSC hockey section had conducted a similar programme with Jerantut District for the last 2 years, CIMB approved the funding with RSC being the benefactors. The RSC team looking into development is spearheaded by YB Dato’R Yogeswaran as advisor and the team members are Dato Poon Foook Loke, Colin Sta Maria, and M A Sambu. This is one of the development projects that RSC hockey section is undertaking aside from the Junior Hockey tournament and visit to Jerantut and Lumut/Pangkor.
There were about 70 school children who attended this programme. Also present were teachers from the schools. The chief coach, Colin Sta Maria briefed the assigned coaches the activity to be carried out and then divided them into four groups. The four basic activities were hitting and stopping, pushing, dribbling and tackling. These coaches then first explained to the teachers the activity which was to be done and followed up by demonstrating and explaining to the children the activity and the techniques to execute. After that was done it was the turn of the children to carry out the activity. Under the watchful eyes of the coaches, the children went about executing the activity with enthusiasm and thrill. The children were rotated from one activity to another until they had completed all four activities. The aspiring goalkeepers were also given some tips on shot stopping and positioning by our goalkeepers, James Sia and Vicky Cone. The two hour coaching programme ended with the children being given a mini game amongst themselves. Although the children were first timers to this sport, it can be said from observation that there is definitely some natural talent to be nurtured here.
YB Dato’ M Davendran, ADUN Kawasan Sabai, then officially launched the event by pledging his support of events of this nature. In his speech he thanked CIMB for coming forward to sponsor the event and programme and Rotary Club Bentong for initiating it. He also thanked RSC for conducting programmes of this nature and hoped that RSC will return to monitor the progress of this initiative. He appreciated the efforts put in by the RSC members who travelled to conduct this programme. YB Dato’ M Davendran also said that these children were fortunate because among the coaches present were ex-Olympians Dato’ Poon Fook Loke as advisor here, chief coach Colin Sta Maria, current national coach advisor Stephen van Huizen and M A Sambu. He said that it was truly an honour that these greats are giving back to hockey in this way and Karak was proud to be associated with this programme as this was the first time that such an initiative was conducted here. In conclusion, he hoped that this was the first step towards Karak producing talented hockey players for the country. Among the club members that travelled were convenor James Sia, Terence, Bobby Ho, Simon See, Jay Ooi, Teh Siew Heng and Yap Siew Bee, who all assisted in the coaching activity.
Terence R.
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