THE Flora GCC Spartans female hockey team of Guyana created history last Sunday evening when they won their third consecutive Under-21 female Hockey Indoor Championships at the Woodbrook Youth Centre in Port-of-Spain, Trinidad. The ladies from the ‘Land of many waters’ flew into the Twin-island republic on Friday  November 12 to contest the weekend tournament for U-21s and hosted by Magnolias Hockey Club for the third year running.
Two years ago in the inaugural competition, an inexperienced GCC shocked the teams of Trinidad, the highly ranked hockey-playing island, by carting off the 2008 trophy. Their repeat of success in 2009 was just as surprising and unexpected but a third and unprecedented victory, in all competitions of the tournament, was the sweetest one yet.
With the loss of the captain and key midfielder, Trisha Woodroffe, the young side knew that it would be particularly difficult this year to match the success to which they had become accustomed.
In their opening match against hosts Magnolias, GCC took an early two-goal lead, only to see it slip away in the fading minutes with Magnolias equalising in the last four minutes and then scoring a winner through a penalty stroke at the final buzzer.  According to coach Philip Fernandes, the players were disappointed but not too disheartened by the loss as they suffered a bit of ill-luck including hitting the goalpost no less than 4 times during the match.
The following day, Saturday 13th, they won two of their three scheduled games, beating Ventures 3-1 and thrashing Magnolias 5-0.
The tournament, which attracted six teams, was divided into two groups of 3 where the teams played each other twice in the preliminary stage. In their final match on Saturday, however, they went under to Ventures by 0-1 in a match that had little bearing on their progress as they had already made the semi-finals.
The semi-final match contested against Paragon proved more difficult than anticipated as the Trinidadian side took an early lead through a goal-mouth scramble.
GCC seemed the more purposeful side and dominated the second half eventually getting the equaliser through captain and inspirational leader, Gabriella Xavier, who unsettled the nets with an accurate penalty corner flick.  The teams finish the match at one apiece leaving the outcome to be decided on a penalty stroke shootout.  Goalkeeper Alysa Xavier then took centre-stage as she denied many of the opposing penalty attempts and to crown an outstanding performance she scored her penalty stroke.
The GCC’s win did not come until the second flick of sudden death when defender Marzana Fiedtkou slammed home her stroke.
The final against the highly touted Notre Dame was another nail-biting affair as GCC’s Dominique DeGroot completed a well-executed build-up play to finish with aplomb after getting by the Notre Dame goalkeeper. The Spartans then defended their lead for most of the match against a side that boasted many Trinidadian junior nationals and one Barbados international as a guest player.
Notre Dame piled on the pressure in the second half of play and created several opportunities to get on level terms, but stout defending by the Fiedtkou sisters, Talia and Marzana, along with another superb performance by Xavier in the goal, dashed all hopes.
GCC’s Samantha Fernandes came closest to scoring and extending her team’s lead with a swift counterattack that, somehow, went inches wide of the empty Notre Dame goal.  The final buzzer came and the score remained the same as the young Flora GCC side celebrated their third consecutive Championship. Alysa Xavier was voted the Most Valuable Goalkeeper for the second year in a row.
The young side under coach Philip Fernandes will be eligible to compete without losing any players due to the age barrier for two more years and will no doubt be clear favourites in 2011.