Upper Great Southern Hockey Association hold annual exhibition clash between WA Country and UGSHA side

The Upper Great Southern Hockey Association held the annual exhibition match between the Upper Great Southern President’s XI and the WA Country men’s team on Saturday night. WA Country claimed glory after a thrilling sudden death shootout handed them a 7-6 win on penalties in front of a packed crowd. It was a brilliant fast-paced game of hockey with the ball moving around the turf fast and efficiently with roughly 450 spectators watching on. WA had the first chance to score, however, a great save from the goalkeeper kept them out before Hayden Mills’ excellent ball movement saw Country slot a terrific goal, giving them the lead. The rest of the quarter saw several more chances, however, great defence by both teams kept the score at 1-0 by quarter-time. In the second quarter the ball went from end to end and despite several great passages of play, no goals were scored. Early in the third term the Upper Great Southern team got a penalty and former Kookaburra Bevan George showed his class by scoring a great individual goal from the corner. Upper Great Southern scored a second goal through a superb build-up led by Kieran Langdridge to take the lead. This sparked the Country side to lift their endeavour and they scored a great equaliser through former Thundersticks player Darren Parkes and both sides went into the last quarter locked at two goals apiece. There were several penalty corners in the last quarter, but some great defence kept the ball out of the net and neither team could break the deadlock at the final whistle. This put the game into the best of five one-on-ones and both teams failed in their first attempts. WA Country scored on their second and third attempt while the Upper Great Southern side scored on their third, fourth and fifth attempt. WA Country scored on their fifth attempt to tie the score up again which put it down to a sudden-death play-off. Both teams scored on the first attempts, Upper Great Southern missed the second but WA Country scored and won the match 7-6 in a thrilling finish.