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Sports News 

Volleyball - VWA Schools Cup

Girls

The GSG girls volleyball team is one of the most hardworking and positive teams I’ve ever had the opportunity to be part of. After training twice a week and competing in the AVA league every Wednesday - as well as a number of us competing in the social league, we were heartbroken when Country Week was cancelled. Unlike a lot of other sports, we were fortunate enough to have the opportunity to participate in the Volleyball WA Schools Cup. Heading into the venue, we’d been warned of the level of competition, our initial goal was to: ‘enjoy the experience’. After our first game against Penrhos we were stoked to come a draw- with the timer running out before the completion of the third set. 

Prior to our next game against Mandurah Baptist College we were on a high, but after some background research we’d discovered that Mandurah Baptist hadn’t lost a game in their Perth league comp. Heading into the game our main goal was to, yet again, ‘just have fun’. We were all shocked as we started winning points and eventually, we won the game, finishing top of our pool. After watching the Mercedes vs Margaret River game, we knew what we were up against. We marginally lost our semi-final to Margaret River- but with such an incredible experience and surprising outcome, we couldn’t feel prouder of ourselves. Later we found out that the grand final match was won by Margaret River, by a larger margin than what we lost by, leaving us all very hopeful for what we can achieve for next year. The boys' team also performed admirably against some high level competition, but unfortunately didn’t make it into the finals. We are all so incredibly grateful to Mr Symonds and Mr Donaldson, such fun and talented coaches are very hard to come by, and we all appreciate the hard work and effort from you both.

 

Stella Mellows | Student

 

Boys

Last Thursday the Country Week volleyball teams hopped on the bus and travelled up to Perth for the Volleyball WA Schools Cup. This tournament is mostly between the top school teams in Perth and the surrounding area, but did include some outside schools, including both us and Margaret River Senior High School. 

 

The bus trip up on Thursday afternoon was long, cramped and met with quite heavy rain, but thanks to Mr Symonds’ careful driving and the constant blast of music, we all made it there, safe and sound, and without too much trouble. We arrived at Ern Halliday Recreation Camp, where we would be staying the night, at around 7.15pm, just in time to set our bags inside our rooms and then walk over for dinner, which was provided to us by the catering staff at Ern Halliday. Following dinner, we went for a stroll around Hillarys, where some people may have spent a bit too much money on lollies, considering our required early start the next day. After this was a quick team meeting followed very soon by bed.

 

Friday began with a crisp 5.30am start, where we showered, ate breakfast and cleaned up our rooms all to get to the bus on time, allowing us to arrive at Warwick Stadium promptly by 7.30am. When walking into that stadium, we all agreed that the air felt different, this is the first real competitive volleyball tournament we’d been involved in against people our own age and we were excited to see how we’d go. After some warming up and confusion as to where we were actually playing, the tournament kicked off with our girls team starting straight away with a game against Penrhos and the boys preparing for our first game at 8.50am versus Canning Vale. 

All in all, the tournament was enjoyed greatly by all, with the boys’ team finishing second in their pool and the girls finishing strongly as well. Thank you very much to Mr Symonds and Mr Donaldson for organising the whole thing and coaching both the teams, this kind of thing wouldn’t be able to go ahead without the incredible support and love for the sport that they have. I also hope that these kind of events will continue to be able to go ahead in the coming years as it was incredibly enjoyable and also a great learning experience to be able to see what level other people our age are performing at.

 

William Penny | Student

Hockey - David Bell Cup

While the Grammar community enjoyed a long weekend, the hockey boys (with the help of Mr Scott and Mr Tompkin), rocked up to Perth on Sunday afternoon with the privilege of representing the school at the highest level. After settling in we indulged on a stroll along the beach, we then had a team meeting, starting off with Ben’s pushups, before we implemented some of Mr Scott’s strategies for Monday. We then proceeded to carb load for a big day on the turf. This involved consuming copious amounts of pasta and for some up and coming chefs; a side of charcoal. For Kaden’s birthday we enjoyed some glorious ice cream in Freo, but unfortunately we were denied the opportunity of a trip on the Fremantle Ferris Wheel.

 

Monday morning we looked at getting in the zone and adjusting our arousal level (as per PE Studies) and prepared for a cracker of a day. Going into our first game Jack was cocky, hoping to get some bangin’ goals, fortunately for us Daniel, our ninja goalie, made up for Jack’s lack of goals, by doing some epic saves, unfortunately we lost 3-0 against Shenton College. The following game Quinten finessed Narrogin, scoring 2 goals in quick succession to get us the win. When we faced Como it was a real arm wrestle, that unfortunately due to some poor decision making gave us a loss. 

 

We had a feed which kept us in the hunt for a podium finish, two - toastie Jack scoring all of our goals against our arch nemesis Bunbury Cathedral Grammar giving us the win!

For our final game we walked around CBC Fremantle, taking an awesome win to finish off the comp. With our forward assailant, Jack scoring a great drag flick after the siren to give the boys a great send off. Beating all the country teams we feel that we have had a successful season representing the school, so the team can be very proud of their efforts. 

Huge thanks to Mr Scott and Mr Tompkin for taking us up and looking after us. 

 

Elijah Wesley | Head Boy

Years Seven/Eight Multi-Sport Carnival

On Tuesday 24 August, 108 students from GSG participated in a hockey and soccer Carnival against other schools in the Great Southern Secondary School Sports Association (GSSSSA) at the North Road Sporting fields.

 

It was a great opportunity for students to select a sport of their choice, participate in a number of fixtures throughout the day. It is a competition designed to; 

  • help give opportunities others wouldn’t normally have (differing divisions) or
  • play a sport they haven’t tried before
  • play with fellow school peers where they may normally play against them in mid week or weekend fixtures whilst representing other clubs.

Additionally, we had 27 Year Nine GSG students who volunteered to coach and umpire during the day. It was really great to see them enjoy the challenges involved with coaching or umpiring and appreciate all staff, parents and other volunteers do in community sport. 

 

We would like to thank Dinah Gordon (LGSHA) and Pawel Pryz-Brown (Football West) for organising the day and all the staff from other schools for their organisation of teams to make it a successful day.  

 

We were very proud of all of their efforts and look forward to attending the carnival again in 2022. 

 

Mr Nathan Symonds and Mrs Naomi Cooper