Another busy week as pre-season fully kicks in this week, but its great to be able to look back at the work of a few people in the background over the four months to run our programme of annual fund-raising tournaments and now summer leagues.

Fund-raising is our second biggest source of hockey income after match fees and makes a major contribution to funding affiliations (c£7-8k per season) and coaching as well as all the other costs involved in running a large hockey club.

Last week we celebrated the end of the main season of fund-raising tournaments and leagues 'season' for 2017 with the conclusion of our summer leagues. Congratulations to Urmston who won the inaugural Men's 7 a side league and debutantes Oldham crowned winners of the women's summer league finals play off's. Thanks to all clubs, teams, players and umpires who supported 9 weeks of fantastic social, but competitive, hockey. We go again next year and already have clubs wanted to sign up with is great.

On behalf of the section we would like to thank out lead organisers for each event who have made a real difference to out fund-raising targets and also give so many players a great time playing hockey.

So a special Timperley Thank You everyone who has helped but particularly our lead organisers:

Colin Taylor - for running the Men's Vets way back in March

Alex Morley - who ran the Men's lower league / teams tournament in April

Jo Nicholson - organised the Ladies Vet's 7's in June

Pat Jones - the Men's Summer League organiser running May to July

Jackie Lord - the Women's Summer league organiser managing 16 teams per week with Cath Thomspson

and Sarah Chancellor - who rang the recent Mixed 7's tournament

Timperley Tuesday's

This week also marks the first time in most club members memory that all senior sides have trained on the same night as we start Club and Performance groups pre-season on Tuesday 18th July. This is a real opportunity for players to mix more, get to know more people across the club and for the Club Training players maybe return to the former days of retiring to the clubhouse after training for a quick drink and catch up - or catch a sneaky peep at the 1's training to pick up some tips !

We have exactly the same space and pitch time as before - we have simply moved all men's and women's sessions to one night using two pitches. With our new team of five coaches lead by Albert we will have a lot more flexibility on the coaching side to continue to give players at all levels a really enjoyable and stretching training session to help everyone improve across all teams.

So if you;re not already involved in the Performance Squad sessions please try and get down to:

- the new look Club Pre-Season training from 7.00pm - 8.30pm on Tuesdays from 18th July

The Performance Squad Pre- Season Training sessions will be running on Tuesday's as well as Saturday's please note the times:

- Tuesdays Performance Squads: 7.30pm - 9.30pm
- Saturday's Performance Squads: 10.00 - 12.00pm

Fit Hit continues on Thursday until the end of July (27th ) 7.15pm meet at the CLub or 7.30pm over at the playground near King George V pool (access of Welman / Urban Road)

We also have an Open Training Session on Saturday 22nd July 10.00am - 12noon with the aim of attracting potential 1/2's players to come and try the club out. You'll see we are also advertising for Women's 1's players too - to strengthen the squad.

On line bookings are now fully open for our 9 days of hockey camps during August and bookings will open later this week for the International Hockey Masterclasses with Kwan Browne.

Finally - its kit order deadline on Sunday 23rd July - so if you want to spread the cost of the new season and get your THC kit ordered if required. See further details and please order on line Pre Season Kit Order (SilverFX)

Hope to see many of you at training this week or over the next few weeks - if you;re not getting enough hockey there's always the chance to swot up on the minor rule changes coming into effect on 1st August 2017 !