Coach lashes Kookaburra management

Wesley and South Perth Hockey Club men’s division one coach Blair Brown believes Albany was robbed of witnessing a higher-quality Melville Toyota League fixture after his side’s 3-1 defeat at the hands of the Suburban Lions last Saturday.

Brown lashed out at the management of the men’s national side, the Kookaburras, which failed to release any current squad members to play for WASP or the Lions in the one-off 2013 regional fixture.

WASP has three players in the Kookaburras side currently playing a Test series against Korea in Perth while the Lions also have two in national colours.

Despite his side going down in the round six match, Brown was upset that none of the five Australian players were made available for the region initiative aimed at promoting the game out of the metropolitan area.

“It wasn’t a flash game,” he said.

“The regional fixture is a great initiative but the national side should be giving us access to national guys. We wanted to come here and put on a good show, that was the most important thing.

“But that game was not an accurate reflection of both teams’ capabilities.

“It would have been nice to see five Australian guys running around. It creates holes in games and makes both teams bring in players they normally wouldn’t.”

Brown said although it was disappointing his Australian representatives Rob Hammond, Kiel Brown and Trent Mitton were not made available, his side were simply outplayed by a more determined Lions outfit.

“It was an underperformance,” he said.

“I honestly think we were poor all over the park, it really did not go to plan.

“Ultimately we created the chances but didn’t finish them, we had enough to finish the game.”

WASP were on the back foot from the outset after Lions striker Josh Allen slammed home the opening goal early in the contest and their impressive link-up play continued as the first half wore on through former local Shaun Ray and Lions skipper Stephen Ray-Hills.

A magical long ball from the Lions defence caught the WASP defence napping and Sam Dixon doubled their advantage with a clever finish 22 minutes into the first half.

Lions goalkeeper James Richardson was superb in the dying moments of the half, denying WASP their opening goal on more than one occasion.

Former Albany teenager Hayden Walker replaced WASP number one goalie Chris Munro in the second half but even he couldn’t prevent the Lions from hitting further ahead as Richard Lawrence capped a super game with a short corner conversion.

Brandon Gibbs finally broke the drought for WASP with eight minutes remaining but it was too late as the Lions walked away 3-1 victors.

“That is exactly what we wanted,” Lions coach Andrew Winter said. “It is only early in the season but it was critical we got some points today.”