TTDF,Paragon to defend hockey titles

SHERDON PIERRE

TT Defence Force (TTDF) men and Paragon women hockey teams are geared up to defend their University of West Indies (UWI) Invitational Indoor Hockey tournament starting today at the UWI SPEC, St. Augustine.

TTDF will do battle against their service counterparts Police at 7.10pm while Paragon will face Police from 8.55pm. The second edition of the tournament will have a total of $11,000 of prize money for the both categories and additional prizes for Most Valuable Players and most goals. There were increases in participating teams as there are ten teams participating for the men and seven for the women.

Grace Jackson, Director of Sport and Head of the Academy of Sport, UWI St Augustine said, “Hockey is important to us in the Academy of Sport in St Augustine because UWISPEC was really developed by Dr. Iva Gloudon who was a hockey player herself and when the indoor court was built there weren’t really any tournaments.” She continued, “We are not just having a tournament this year but also having the presence a team from outside the country. We strategically did it at this time because we had two tournaments in successive weekends which gave the athletes an exceptional chance of having two high-level tournaments in a two-week period.”

The St. Augustine Campus is currently hosting several events simultaneously and she commented, “We are having two cricket tournaments and a hockey tournament, it is difficult because we do not have much staff but as sport people we understand how to overcome difficulties. We are learning from the opportunity of being able to have three high-level competitions at UWISPEC and to bring the attention to the rest of the country that UWISPEC plays an important role in sports development not just in one sport but in different sporting activities.”

The former Jamaican sprinter said, “I expect the tournament to be an exciting tournament, the tone has been set. We want to see good hockey being played and lots of people coming

The groups are follows:

Group A (Men): Supernova, QPCC 1, UWI, Notre Dame, Malvern

Group B (Men): QPCC 2, TTDF, Police, Paragon, Fatima

Group A (Women): Ventures, UWI, Magtastic, Notre Dame, Paragon, Police, PINK

Today’s Fixtures:

6pm UWI vs Ventures (Women)

6pm UWI vs QPCC 1 (Men)

7pm TTDF vs Police (Men)

7.45pm Magatastic vs Notre Dame (Women)

8.20pm Supernova vs Notre Dame (Men)

8.55pm Paragon vs Police (Women)

9.30pm PINK vs Ventures (Women)

10.05pm Paragon vs Fatima (Men)