This weekend we have Ladies 1's (12.30pm) , 2's (2.15pm) and the unbeaten Men's 2's (4.00pm) all at home and the Men's 1's away at Brooklands (13:30) but a EH Masters home double header on Sunday ! Come down and support the teams, check out the bar menu and support the Blues.

Please be aware Christmas Tree sales at the Club from the bottom car park start soon - so be aware we will lose a few parking spaces and the Wood Lane gate will be open at busy times to reduce congestion on the main drive. If meeting at the club for away games please try and park in the top car park and leave via Wood Lane (assuming open) to help prevent the bottle necks on the main drive.

This Saturday the Ladies 1's host Loughborough Students in their last IWHL match of the first block of games - its been a tough rally of games after a really good start away at Sutton Coldfield back at the end of September. It remains core to our overall aims for THC to have National League status and we remain confident that Men's 1 will be joining the Ladies 1 in the expanded National League next season.

The results haven't gone the Ladies 1 ways over recent weeks and we thank everyone for their support. The girls have played some really good hockey and the challenge now is to maintain this for 70 minutes, increase the consistency and bounce back as we know at the top level the smallest error will be capitalised on by the opposition. So lets give the girls that 12th player lift tomorrow and send them into the winter break ready to re-group and bounce back when the IWHL restarts on 2nd February.

A big thank you to this weekends Match Day Sponsors - Nigel and Janet Stanhope and their Broomedge Farm Traditional Turkeys ! Check out the infamous Turkeys on Nigel's facebook page and email info@broomedgefarm.co.uk , phone or see Nigel at the club to place your order.

The Men's 1's stay in the top three after their defeat last week against table toppers Wakefield and go again this week and we hope they will be back to winning ways away at Brooklands who have suffered back to back defeats. The Men's 2's remain undefeated after another win and stay top of NWHL Division 2 by one point, and finally the Men's 4's are sitting in third place.

Thanking Co-op Members in Timperley Village this weekend

Tim, Perley, Nisha and members of the Academy will be down at the Timperley Co-op Food Store on Saturday from 1pm as part of the 'thank you' to Co-op members who've helped raise £19m for local causes. As THC we've benefited from £3250 during our 12 months as a Co-op Local Cause.

Thank you to all the Co-op members who chose THC as their Co-op Local Cause and for all those Co-op members who didn't choose a local cause but used their membership cards (as this helped raised the £19m we have benefited from. Jut goes to show Just goes to show that pennies can mount up to a tidy sum. If you'd like to get involved in coaching or umpiring contact Shelagh, Caroline Small or Nisha Sathi and we will be able to support you and fund training using the Co-op monies.

EH Round Up

Last weekend's EH games brought two win and two loses - the Ladies Over 35's came our winners in the local derby away at Sale with a fine 0-4 win with the goals firing in once the girls got into their stride with three goals in the second half. The O35's have a home draw in the next round verses Boston Spa on 16th December (pitch tbc).

The Boys Under 14 entered tier 1 of the championships and after the disappointment of Harrogate pulling out and not having a game in October got their campaign off to a solid start with the home 3 -1 win against Alderley Edge. Albert believes the boys have more in the tank and face Bowdon in the last round robin game in the New Year and hopefully a place in the regional north west round. Not such a good day for the U14 Girls who travelled to strong Flyde side and lost 7-0. The Under 16 Girls gave a good fight away at Neston and went down 2-0. Regrettably due to last minute player unavailability the U18's have to forfeit their knock out game, also away at Flyde and that's the end of their EH games for this year.

A reminder for all teams that if we cancel at short notice we are liable to pay for teas (home and away) and in some cases pitch hire (away games).

This weekend the mighty Mixed XI were due to play Golborne in their first EH game of the season but Golborne have withdrawn so no Mixed game this weekend. Instead why not come down to the Club on Sunday 25th November and two top Masters matches:

13:00 Men's Over 40s v South Wirral
14:30 Ladies Over 45's v Alderley Edge

Other Hockey News

We held our third all captains session on Monday and did a quick review of how the season is going pulled out some key themes. Overall the captains identified a number of areas that were going well - player numbers , numbers for all senior training sessions, larger squad sizes on a Saturday and lots of interest in hockey !

The flip side being areas to look at and ideally improve. So we'll be keeping an eye on numbers at training (by group) and working with the coaches to look at how we best use the pitch space and blend whiteboard and tactical sessions to help all aspects of player and team development. We'll be assessing the case of adding senior teams next season but this is only feasible if new captains can be identified. We also agreed the following:

- Saturday Green Pitch timings: when we have three games (rather than four) the middle game will be moved to 2.15pm to be the same time as the Blue Pitch to open up a nit more flexibility on the umpire allocation. On a four match day on the Green Pitch we need to work harder at keeping to the agreed time slots, keep warms quick and half time quick

Selection / Playing Policy - we're firming up a policy that we can share with all players shortly to help improve understanding of how and why selection works in the way it does.

Team Manager Vacancies - we fortunate as a club as we have coaches and managers for our 1's and 2's but all captains agreed that as the other 7 senior teams are now often going to games with 14-16 players that it would make a big difference on match days to have a manager supporting each team (Men's 3 - 6 and Ladies 3 - 5's) to help organise the subs and rotations of players and be part of a match day with the squad. It would be great if there are any former players, supporters or parents who fancy getting involved - wither on a regular basis or just when you can it would really be make a big difference. Talk to any of the captains or our Club Captains Cuey and Kieran

Umpiring - we are beginning to rely on a smaller group of umpires which is unfair and not meeting the principle of sharing the load. We'll be looking with Will Reynolds our Umpire Co-ordinator , at how we can work with the current assessed and un-assessed umpires to make the games happen and share the load. We need to increase the number of female umpires as overall numbers are still low compared to the Men. Nick Burnett will supporting the unassessed umpires as they get more games under their belts.

Committee Meeting - this coming Monday we have our next meeting when we'll be signing off more policies as part of our review of processes and procedures. This will include Face masks and Health and Safety and we'll be sharing the Polices once agreed.

Former Members Lunch - big thank you to Nick Burnett who organises lunches during the year for former TSC members. The latest was today and it was good to see former players and supporters back at the club, including 'Mars Bar' Dave who was done and if recovering well after illness. Dave's hoping to be back watching again when the weather improve as he's been missed on the side lines by both 1st teams.

Finally, this week we wish Malcolm a speedy recovery after his operation this week.