Sport News

Mr Luke Caplick

Let’s start with some great news – our Open Hockey will play in a Grand Final on Friday afternoon against St Edmunds College. More details are below. Other than that, it was a challenging weekend of sporting fixtures against Iona College, but it was great to be out playing again as we plough ahead despite our southern states not having the privilege to enjoy any sport. For those who play sport, we must accept that we will have our good days and bad days; we learn to take the wins and losses graciously. In this case, we congratulate Iona on their results and encourage our own players to learn from the experience and come out looking to improve over the next two weeks.

Our tennis teams deserve to be applauded for their success, winning 11 matches, drawing one, with just four losses across the whole program. Well done to our successful Year 5 and Year 9 Rugby league Teams. Our basketball teams fought hard against Iona and had plenty of opportunities but didn’t seize the key moments.

I am a big believer that many good lessons in life can be learnt whilst playing sport. Sometimes you work hard and get the results and sometimes you do not. Developing a sense of resilience when things do not go your way and being happy knowing that you did the necessary work are worthwhile values to instil in our student-athletes.

The AIC Track and Field training program is in full swing with our first AIC meet at QSAC this Thursday. Buses will depart with our secondary students from the College at 3:10pm and return at the conclusion of the program at around 8:30pm. The program of events for this meet can be viewed on the College App, under Track and Field. Thursday is free dress at the College; boys must get changed into their sports uniform at 2nd break, which incorporates the new MCA training shirt or the Athletics training singlet, College running shorts and MCA socks as their uniform. It is pleasing to report that the T&F coaches have been impressed with the attendance at training so far this season. Let’s ensure we build on this as we lead into our meets. Well done to all boys who have been attending and giving their best at training. Although we know there are many things happening within our sports program at the moment, we ask those boys who have been selected in the Track and Field squad to attend their respective training disciplines each week. The training schedule is posted on the App under the AIC Track and Field section. The second AIC meet for the season will be held next Thursday 9 September at QSAC, details will be published on the App.

The 2021 Track and Field camp will be held at the BLK Sports Performance Centre again this year. We have been provided with an opportunity to take 64 students along. Invitations will be sent out to boys and, while we would like to invite all of the boys involved in training, we are unfortunately restricted to the 64 students attending.

Marist College Ashgrove’s success across all sports comes about because most within our community make it a success. It does not just happen. If we strive to be the best, we all must take responsibility to ensure we do our part to make MCA a great community. Our College would not be the great place it is if we did not have our best giving their best.

There is little use possessing a gift or talent and not using it. After each round of sport or each championship event, we are satisfied and happy if we know our students and coaches gave their best throughout the season and have enjoyed themselves along the way. If we are all striving to be our best, the result is secondary.

Congratulations to our College Track and Field throws coach Des Davis who is returning from Tokyo after his Javelin thrower Corey Anderson ended at the Paralympics in a close 4th position, 15cm off a bronze medal in the F38 div. Well done to Corey, a former world record holder in the division and of course to Des his coach who has helped many Marist boys in the last seven years during our run of AIC titles. Great job Des and can’t wait till you return from quarantine to work with the boys!

Hockey – Ms Kathryn Badini

On Friday afternoon Brisbane Schoolboys Hockey resumed with all fixture games needing to be played out in one afternoon at the State Hockey Centre. For us, that meant three 20-minute games, which would determine the final playoff positions.

We started against St Edmund’s, unfortunately going down 2-nil, not that we had long to mourn the loss before we had to grab our gear and move to another field. This time we played Padua, and with an appropriate warm-up, won 4-1, with spectacular goals coming from Jacob Anderson (12) and Sam Keir (12).

With some quick sums back to our original field, we realised that our final game against Kelvin Grove State High would determine which one of us would play St Edmund’s in the Grand Final. The stakes could not be higher, but with Jacob Anderson scoring early in the game, our boys remained strong to defend it; ending the game-winning 1-nil.

Overall, while an incredibly stressful experience, it is one that the team will have learnt a lot from, needing to embrace the moment to support each other. We would also like to thank the boys who came to cheer on the team; you definitely added to the atmosphere of the day. It should also be noted that Lucius Jeynes (10) did some brilliant saves as goalie; especially as it was his first time in the pads.

We now go into the Grand Final against St Edmund’s this Friday at 4:15pm at the State Hockey Centre. We are the defending champions so no doubt it’ll be a great game. Any boys who would like to support the team this Friday, are welcome to email Ms Badini badinik@marash.qld.edu.au for further details.

Tennis – Mr Andrew Ward

Here is a wrap up the tennis from last Saturday’s matchup against Iona College. Starting with our 1st IV with a traditional ceremony before play to pay respects to the traditional owners of the land. Very touching and our boys were very respectful and embraced the changing of words between the two captains.

Straight from the start, we were going to be in a battle with a very determined Iona side, which in the wrap up were just too strong for our boys with the scoreline really not showing the closeness of some of the matches and the chances that our boys had.

A better result from our undefeated 2nd IV with some stand out performances in singles matches fighting back to take the win. A huge congratulations to all the boys but in particular Mr Freddie Power with a determined demolishing of his opposite winning 6-0 and giving our team some hope. Great wins by Josh Waite and Tom Kerr in their singles having to win the last two matches to win the tie. Great to watch boys and the hard work on the court is paying off.

Fantastic results in all year levels winning 11 and 1 draw from 16 teams.

A reminder to all to keep turning up for training so we can finish strongly and hopefully win as many Premierships as possible.

Hard work does pay off boys and with St Peters coming up this weekend let’s make sure we are as ready as we can possibly be and show them the Marist spirit and determination.

Squad and group coaching

A reminder that Squads are filling very quickly and once full, we will not be able to take any more bookings for this term.

Logo Competition

Two weeks until we reveal our Design winner for MCA Tennis.

Don’t miss out on the winner receiving one term of Private tennis lessons.

Good Luck.

Rugby League

It was always going to be a tough round against Iona College and several games showed how strong an opposition they are. We finished the weekend with two wins and four losses, and a draw. Congratulations to our Year 5 and Year 9 teams for taking out the win against quality opposition. With only St Pat’s remaining in Round 7 (Bye weekend this weekend as St Peter’s don’t field Rugby League teams), it is fantastic to see that so many teams are remaining positive in finishing the season strong. I urge all boys to continue to remain focussed and train hard over the next two weeks to take out a win against St Pat’s in our final round. Our 1st XIII had a disappointing loss, leading 14 nil at halftime, the second half saw a completely different team take the field and it was extremely disappointing to witness the same lack of discipline that cost us against Padua creep into our game again. They will no doubt be wanting to redeem themselves next weekend against St Patricks College 1st XIII, who won the Year 10 AIC Rugby League premiership when our current Year 12’s were Year 10 in 2019.

I would like to make a special mention to our Year 7 Rugby League Coach, Mr Greg Lynch, who has been training a group of Year 7 boys who missed Rugby League selection every Monday afternoon to keep them interested and help upskill them for future years. This afternoon these boys will play a game on the Main Oval with our 1st XIII players there to support.