The HMC Festival
The winning U15 Stonyhurst netball team, with Miss Ellis (left) and Mrs Kay (right).
A glorious day beckoned; in fact if anything many of the girls would say it was “too hot for sport! ” Over 32 individual teams from a range of HMC North West Schools entered the Festival, which this year was organised and hosted by Stonyhurst for the first time. The format of the day was U13 & U15 Netball and U14 & U16 hockey.
Netball report
The HMC Netball Tournament saw a fantastic level of skill from both age groups and took on a ‘round robin’ format: the girls played 7 games of netball throughout the day. This was extremely tiring with the hot sun beating down on the netball courts!
The U13 competition was won by Stockport GS and Newcastle-under-Lyne were runners- up.
The U15 tournament was won by Stonyhurst who were unbeaten for the entire day and played some wonderful netball.
The winning team were: Yoma Ziregebi, Olivia Laking, Iona Graham, Genevieve Turner, Hannah Fogden, Isobel Coulston, Molly MacManamon and Beattie Smith.
The runners-up position came down to goal difference from Newcastle and Kings School Macclesfield. Newcastle were the eventual runners up on count back.
U16 Hockey Report
The HMC Hockey Tournament proved to be a great success for the students. Six teams took part in the round-robin competition, with Stonyhurst entering two teams.
The Stonyhurst A team played with a lot of skill and determination. Their captain Emily Smith was as usual inspirational in leading her team to victory in 4 out of their 5 matches; they dominated in most of their games twice winning 6 - 0. Goal of the Tournament came from Ellie Butschok-Brain who scored a sizzling second half goal against Kings Macclesfield, striking the ball just inside the ‘D’ and whizzing it past the goal keeper into the top left side of the goal.
In their third match, against Liverpool College, they were victorious again, winning by two goals. It soon became apparent that the match against Arnold School would decide the outcome of the tournament. Despite a valiant attempt the girls were disappointed to lose 2- 0. However it was no disgrace losing to a team who were National Champions!
In the final match against KEQM normal service was resumed with the girls winning 3 -0. Claudia Mastrobouni scored two terrific goals in this game. Ann Marie Connolly, Faith Aylward, Yael Morkens, Helen Finn and Emma Leach all played fantastically well to finish the day as runners up.
The B team demonstrated the College's strength in depth by winning and drawing two of their matches. Daisy Chitnis lead the team comprising of Charlotte Duckworth, Hattie Grout Smith, Rhianna Hughes, Nicole Pedley, Maddie O'Dwyer Charlotte Kelly and Lily Young.