East Youth Competitions Committee

 

Minutes of the meeting held on March 9th 2006.

Present: L.Bant Chair, F.Wheeler (Secretary and Competitions Secretary), B.Barr(Lincs), A.Bloom (Norfolk), K.Boulter (Suffolk), J.Pagliaro (Beds), S.Tippen (Cambs),

N.Unwin (Essex) G.Welch and J.Wood (Herts).

 

Apologies from D.Thom (Essex) and B.Pollard (Umpires Rep).

 

Joint Meeting

1. Minutes: Due to a communications difficulty the minutes were not distributed as usual.  The Chair read them out.  Those who had been present at the meeting agreed  and they were signed.

2. Matters arising: A further discussion was held on the change to the rules of the competitions. An addition was made to those agreed on at the last meeting which stated that;  In the event of one team not arriving on time due to unforeseen circumstances, the Technical Officer’s decision in rescheduling the game would be final. The 1st alteration on the previous meeting’s minutes has been deleted. 

3. Correspondence.  A reply had been sent to Judy Lee-Smith in answer to her letter at the previous meeting and a copy was given to the Secretary.

4. East.  The Management wish to up-date the Constitution. Representatives were asked to read it and send any comment s to the Chair by March 17th in time for the management meeting.

5. England.  A discussion as held on the LTAD recommendations for future competitions.  These had been summarised by D.Walsh of Suffolk.  Concern was expressed by all at some of the changes, particularly the removal of the regional schools U14 competitions, and the regional county competitions at U13,U14 and U15 age groups although a National competition was proposed for the U16 and U17 age groups.  It was felt that these recommendations would remove the place of the counties in the development of both players and new umpires.  The recommendation is to replace these competitions with U14 and U15 High Performance Assessment Camps  and 2 Academies in each region. There were also to be changes at the U19 and U21 level.  The full document can be downloaded from the England Hockey web-site. The next stage of consultation will begin in April. 

6. There was no report from the umpires, although a verbal communication had been made to the effect that umpire provision had gone well this year.

7. Next year’s Mini date will be April 22nd 2006, the date specified by  England Hockey.   Although this is after the Easter holiday it was thought that schools would be back by then. A plea was made by this year’sU11 organiser for umpires for this event on March19th  as although the teams had been asked to provide them,  some neutral umpires were needed.  Both Lincs and Bedford  thought they could help.

U21s. After a consideration of the dates in the calendar, the proposed date fro this was December 30th. Counties were asked to investigate possible venues.

 

Girls Representatives meeting     

The finals days of the U15 and U17 Leagues had been held on March 5th 2006. At U.E.A. the pitches had been renovated and the new surface was much appreciated by the players.  However, there was great disappointment expressed at the absence of the East U15 and U17 regional coaches.  Subsequently it was found that Jane Hurt had been put in the unenviable position of being invited to be the U17 coach by e-mail which had not reached her in time.  There was no news on the U15 coach.

Discussion was held on the programme for next year’s fixtures.  The date for  tournaments for the U15 and U17 was proposed on March 10th/11th and counties were asked to confirm their interest in  this to Loraine by March 17th in time for the Management meeting.  The tournaments were to be held as well as the leagues and would provide the winners for the England County Championships

Reports were tabled by Suffolk, Cambridge and Essex.  Essex and Cambs recorded their disappointment over the lack of East Coaches at the finals day.  Trials for Essex were to be in September apart from the U15s.  Cambs felt that this season’s fixtures were too far apart, but as noted before there were many considerations involved in these decisions.  

The proposed Programme is attached.

 

Boys Representatives Meeting

J. Pagliaro wanted to confirm details about the Boys U12 competition. There was a discussion on whether the boys U12 County competition should have B teams as well as A teams.  It was felt by 5 teams that one team would be sufficient.  Medals and a trophy would be provided.

County Reports were tabled from Suffolk, Beds, Herts  and Cambs.  Herts had been helped by the new Herts Hockey development Officer, Peter Simmons to put in place people to run the U11,U12 and U13 squads for this year. Beds is hoping to field an U15 as well as an U14 team in the county championships. 

The proposed programme is attached.

The meeting finished at 9.00pm.

Next meeting on April 27th 2006.