Tallaght-side Glenanne won the Eurohockey Trophy yesterday thanks to an inspired Stephen Butler, beating host club CA Montrouge in Paris 5-4 in an epic final.
In a whirlwind start, the Glens found themselves 1-0 down within three minutes. But, in a wildly open game, Stephen Butler gave the Irish side the lead by the ninth minute with two drag-flicks.
He completed his hat-trick from another penalty to make it 3-2 as half-time closed in. Brendan Parsons extended the lead to 4-2 with 25 minutes remaining but the French side fought back once more, levelling the game for a third time at 4-4
But such a game was made for just one man to be the hero. Butler stepped up to net his fourth of the day with seven minutes to go and seal the title – hockey’s equivalent of the UEFA Cup.
Butler was to end the tournament as top-scorer with nine goals in three games after missing the opening 4-2 loss to Kolos Sekoia. That loss left the Glens hopes of a final place hanging by a thread.
But two subsequent 5-0 wins over Grasshoppers, Zurich and Slavia Praha with Sekoia drawing twice meant Glenanne slipped into the final to face their Parisian hosts.
To see some photos of the Grasshoppers match, click here and for some of the supporters click here
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6 comments:
well done glens... paint the town green!
well done glens... paint the town green!
Great result for Glenanne... ok they needed one or two results to go their way after the opening match... but they did the business in the end.
EHL rankings after Round 1 have been released and show Ireland holding on to 10th place just behind France and ahead of Switzerland.
http://www.eurohockey.org/ehl/2008_03_01RankingPositionsAfterRound1.pdf
Although France will get some additional points for Paris St. Germain making it through to EHL Round 3 before being knocked out by Club Egara, Glenanne will help claw some of those back finishing ahead of the French in the Trophy final.
Ireland will maintain our EHL ranking of 10th place and have one club representative in next years EHL and one club representative in the Eurohockey Trophy.
Actually they only consolidated their 10th position and are marginally behind Russia (9th) & Scotland (8th) - didn't gain ground on either. France jumped to 5th.
Ref the confusing table (updated 26-Mar) published at: http://www.eurohockeyleague.eu/news/news-archive/updated-ehl-ranking-france-with-two-teams-italy-and-ukraine-in-ehl
However we are significantly ahead of Ukraine in 11th & others behind them.
The good news that next season we discard a bad score from 2006 whereas teams around us will be discarding higher scores so we may gain a couple of places with good performances. Poland & Russia may be the targets we have to do better than.
Yep Rankings just updated to take account of EHL round 3 results and the EuroTrophy which Glenanne won.
Phenominal jump by France who will now have 2 clubs in the EHL next year and are only one ranking place off having 3... although Germany still have enough of a gap, despite dropping to 4th.
If our club in next year's EHL competition can finish ahead of Scotland and Russia then I think we can make ground to achieving 8th place which would entitle Ireland to two clubs in the EHL.
The key though is for the EHL qualified club (All-Ireland champions) to make it past the first round and again for the EuroTrophy qualified club (Irish Senior Cup champions) to reproduce Glenanne's result and make it to the final.
Pembroke only earned Ireland 8 points this year with Glenanne earning 12 points giving us an average of 10 points.
In addition as DoctorD pointed out, we will be ditching the 2006 results which will also help us bridge the gap.
I heard the presentation of medals was a 'shambles' for the lads!
Firstly they didn't get the official winners trophy which the Cork Harlequins team won last year - whether this wasn't returned by them or elsewhere along the line remains to be seen.
After hanging around for 15mins the organisers just walked out into the crowd of players and supporters and just handed the trophy over and doled out the medals unceremoniously. I'm sure it would have been a lenghty affair full of 'pomp' if the Montrouge team had of won.
From looking at a few of the photos you would think Montrouge won by the size of the big gold trophy and Glenanne were ecstatic with runners up and their little substitute silver trophy! Terrible way to end, from what I'm told, was a cracking final...
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