The season started with the team pleased with a range of players to choose from and the likelihood of others coming into the fold through the season. The joining of West Central 2 & 3 meant we stayed in the same league, but the opposition changed and we were pleased to be in a larger league with more competitive games to be played, a good opportunity to get lots of players plenty of game time.

The season started a week before the rest of the club, so after a friendly against Wooton and our own 2nd XI we had an understanding of how we wanted to start, but were aware that we faced a start against some of the stronger teams in the league, and so it proved. It took a couple of games to get our best formation and how we wanted to play and it was clear that we started to understand how each other played and we had a core of players who were able to provide a structure to the squad, this lead to us letting in the fewest goals in the bottom half of the table. The challenge was due to injuries to some of our most experienced forwards we struggled at the other end to find the net as regularly as we would have liked.

Despite our results which weren’t as great as we would have liked, the social side which has proved a real strength of the 3s was again evidence with our time spent off the pitch being equally important to us and helped the bonds within the team, this was evident with a well attended social held by the team in January supporting all the ages in the squad and their families.

The second half of the season continued in a similar vein to the first half, with us finding it difficult to get a result against the top teams, but performing well against the lower ones. Throughout, we continued to play our hockey well and it was clear to see the team learning from each other to get better as we progressed.

Most satisfying for me as captain was the number of new players we were able to bring in to the senior teams, 6 new juniors making their club senior league debuts through the season as well as 4 new adult members to the club all of whom were able to play a part and strengthen the team through a range of positions. Memorable moments for me through the season included playing with my son Josh in his first senior game, as a coach for the juniors seeing so many of them getting opportunities and the team really gelling and playing some excellent hockey to beat OB’s E 7-0.

Our last game of the season was played away at Bridgwater and although we played well they were just a little better, but we competed and there was only one goal in it until the final moments. We were then able to go out as a team to a restaurant in Bridgwater to finish our season as we had been throughout – a friendly squad enjoying spending time together on and off the pitch.