I am a little annoyed this week.  

On Monday, our Senior Hockey girls won the grand final against MLC with the pretty amazing score line of 11-0!  

The reason I am annoyed is that I did not get to watch the game! This is the same team which I wrote about a few weeks ago where the girls displayed extraordinary sportsmanship. In the victorious grand final team was Scarlett Davis (Captain), Sarah Pratt, Adelaide Mitchell, Emma Froomes (filling in as Goalkeeper), Caitlin Wang, Lily Taylor, Charlotte Rowe, Samantha Love (Victorian U21 team representative), Phoebe Russell (Victorian U18 team representative) and Katharine Carter (Victorian U18 Development team) and coached by Mr Scott Dacy. Absent from the team was Lucy Dunlop (Victorian U18 team representative) who unfortunately missed the match with COVID. Lucy has been an instrumental player in this team since Year 7 and it was such a shame, she missed the game. Quite a star-studded line-up of talent, I am sure you will agree. 

This Hockey Team has won the grand final each season since they were in Year 7. I have had the pleasure of being their coach each year and have seen all their matches until now. It has been a fascinating journey to watch these girls grow up right before my eyes. They were bright and bubbly little kids in Year 7, and as a coach of young players, you focus on ensuring they enjoy their sport and do not really worry about the results of each game. Of course, everyone likes to win but it is genuinely a secondary focus. All you want is to see them enjoy the game, compete hard and leave the playing field satisfied they have done their best. 

The girls who played in the grand final this week are an amazing group of young women. They play with commitment, they play with passion, they play with skill, and above all, they have fun. Each of these girls represents the best of what we aspire St Catherine’s girls to be. Even though I missed their game this week, I have enjoyed some chats about the game with a few of them over the last couple of days at lunchtime. Even with the dominant score of 11-0, they said there were some nervous moments. Towards the end of the match, the girls from MLC, who never gave up fighting, pressed hard and had a few shots on goal where they narrowly missed and hit the post. Our girls were determined to keep their opponents scoreless. I suggested this was being a little ruthless, as the game was done and dusted. Their response back to me was an indication of their character. “Mr Marshall,” one of them said, “MLC deserved to have us play at our very best. That is the respect we owe to them as opponents. They deserve our best effort.” 

There was no doubting the sincerity behind this comment. These are the same girls who a few weeks ago happily cancelled a game against a less than full strength Ivanhoe Girls Grammar team and instead divided up into two teams of mixed players so they could have a proper contest. For this team, it is not just about winning. It is about the journey. The journey as an individual and the journey of the team. I am reminded of an extraordinary woman Freya Stark (1893 –1993), who was a British-Italian explorer and travel writer. She wrote more than two dozen books on her travels in the Middle East and Afghanistan, as well as several autobiographical works and essays. She was one of the first non-Arabs known to travel through the southern Arabian Desert in modern times. When discussing what excellence means she wrote “This is excellence – the following of anything for its own sake and with its own integrity.” 

The girls in this team have demonstrated integrity in every sense of the word.  Not just in this grand final but all season, and in the matches over the years for St Catherine’s. It is no wonder this team boasts several state representatives, given the approach they bring to the game. 

Another extraordinary woman is Arlene Blum. She is a mountaineer who is best known for leading an all-woman ascent in 1978 of Annapurna in Nepal, one of the world’s most famous and highest peaks, standing at over 8,000 metres in altitude.  Arlene and her team did what many thought was impossible. Not only did a woman stand atop the mountain but the expedition was completed entirely by an all-woman team.   

In her book Annapurna: A woman’s Place, Arlene wrote “As long as you believe what you are doing is meaningful, you can cut through fear and exhaustion and take the next step. The greatest rewards come only from the greatest commitment.” Climbing a Himalayan peak takes commitment, courage and above all else, teamwork. Our girls have displayed all these attributes in abundance. They deserve their success and our praise.   

But I am still annoyed I missed seeing the game!