European Championships 2001

This is the text from an article about the tournament from LacrosseTalk. We have reproduced it here as that version is not that easy to read, which you can see if you go to the the original article.

See also our archive page on the subject.

At the end of June a group of strangers posing as lacrosse players met in Reading, the home of the Wildcats. Their mission - to form themselves into a crack force capable of retaining the European title for England. With just a fortnight to prepare, a squad of 23 was formed to complete the objective. This is their story…

Saturday 14 July

We were to meet at 11 o’clock in the morning in Cardiff at the universities’ halls of residence, meaning an early start for everybody. Following a brief diversion round the centre of Cardiff we eventually found the university halls located round the back of a 24-hour Tescos and a McDonalds. How convenient!

Once we got there and settled into our rooms we had our first training session together as a team until the middle of the afternoon. Our training pitches were by the side of the River Taff. When we got there, there were only two goals available, a bit of a problem with five teams wanting to use them. We cut short our training session to allow the Scots the use of our goal.

That evening we had the opening ceremony preceded by a parade through the city centre. The parade started at the national institute for sport and was led by a bandmaster akin to something out of Live and Let Die (you know that bit in New Orleans with the funeral procession) to the city hall. Thanks to Robbie Williams performing at the Millennium Stadium there was quite a crowd watching our procession. After a brief ceremony we were taken to the police station for a buffet meal and entertainment from a male voice choir.

Sunday 15 July

Woken early by noisy seagulls on the roof of the building. Had breakfast then went down to the pitches for a light morning training session before our 3 o’clock game against Ireland. After training we had a light lunch before getting on the coach to Penarth where all the games were held.

Our game against Ireland was their first ever competition game but as the complete unknowns we were cautious about the game. This was also our first game together so we were delighted to run out 17-5 victors with Ryan Pettit scoring seven goals.

Having returned to the rooms, nobody was in the mood for cooking so a group of us went exploring in Cardiff for somewhere to eat.

Monday 16 July

The seagulls are at it again. I think there must [be] a breeding ground on the roof of the building. There was another light morning session in preparation for our game against Scotland. The face-off was 3 o’clock again and the match turned out to be relatively low scoring compared to the Ireland game, with a 9-4 score in our favour. Chris Wells in goal was superb, making a string of fine saves, as was John Marr in goal for Scotland who made sure certain club-mates didn’t get bragging rights over him for the coming season.

After our physical encounter with the Scottish I made my first trip to see Steve Cluney, our team physio and sports masseur. Everybody on the team who had already paid him a visit was raving about how much better they felt afterwards but they weren’t exaggerating about how painful it is.

Tuesday 17 July

These seagulls are really starting to annoy me now. It’s disrupting my beauty sleep.

For the first time since we arrived the weather turned really bad. It was decided to not have a training session in the morning but hold a team meeting in the bar instead and watch some lacrosse videos in the students’ union bar. It was this day that our 22-man squad finally became 23 with the long awaited addition of Matt Beadle, bringing with him some real Manchester weather (sheets of rain, you gotta love it).

The game against the Czech Republic was played on a pitch bearing some resemblance to a winter’s day at Brabyns Park with Mellor. The conditions should have favoured the English but at half time the score was 8-4 against.

Having retired to the changing rooms at the half in order to regain circulation and composure, we came outfighting and eventually took a 12-8 lead, the Czechs getting two late goals to make the final score line 12-10. The Iron Man of Oldham, Steve Green, was in his element in this game, scoring three as the Czech defenders repeatedly bounced off his torso. Special mention must go to Wil Kent for the 10-yard aquaplaning ground-ball dive, not quite orthodox technique but a real crowd-pleaser.

As well a special mention must go to the laundrette in Penarth who managed to get Will’s shirt so clean afterwards.

After this gritty performance, coach Dave Hallows ordered a night out to celebrate and unwind. The union bar as always was our starting point before sampling the nightlife in town.

Wednesday 18 July

I didn’t hear the seagulls this morning. finally a good night’s sleep. The team decided to go and watch the Czech-German game, the match-up widely expected to be in the final. The Germans were the winners and the Czech team looked a little tired, possibly from our match against them. That result meant that if we beat Wales we would be in the final.

Face-off was at 6pm with both sides eager to win well. The game started slowly, going to a 2-2 draw before England pulled away to take the game 15-5 thanks to the outstanding face-off work of 17 vear-old Dan Kallaugher who lost only one out of 28 faces during the match.

Having completed our initial aim of reaching the final we returned to the university to rest up before our last group game against our opposition in the final Germany.

Thursday 19 July

Seagulls at it again. Thinking about buying a rifle and going shooting on the roof. The morning was taken up by a team talk on how we should counter the German teams tactics together with lacrosse videos.

The game itself began at 3 o’clock and quickly turned into a rather sour contest with Ryan Pettit sustaining an injury early on that had the entire team incensed. Unfortunately after a trip to hospital Ryan was deemed to have 3 broken ribs and 5 more ribs badly bruised, ending his playing participation in the tour.

The final score was 15-4 to the German team as our entire squad lost focus for the first time.

We returned to our rooms deeply disturbed by the afternoon’s events but determined to remedy the situation in the final on Saturday. As the next day was a rest day, it was decided as a team that we would all have a night out in town along with every other lacrosse player resident in the city that night. This happened to include two U19 teams from the west coast of the USA No more information can be given unfortunately as tour rules do apply. Sorry but what goes on tour stays on tour! (I might be open to bribes though.)

Friday 20 July

Today was the rest day and we spent it training in preparation for the final. We got our tactics sorted and everyone was pumped, ready to face the Germans the next day. We had a team meal that night together with our dedicated support group who had followed our fortunes all week. A big thank you goes to Ryan’s family and Dan’s parents for all their encouragement throughout the week. It was greatly appreciated by the team.

Didn’t get good night’s sleep. Was it just nerves? Maybe, but the seagulls could have had something to do with it again.

Saturday 21 July

The big day. The final. A light training session took up the morning followed by lunch before we made our way to the ground. The game was preceded by the national anthems for the first time in the tournament as we lined up. The game began well and was fairly even with our tactics to neutralise the German’s strengths working. Two extra man goals in the last minute before half time put us 6-4 ahead.

Unfortunately the second half was a different story as the German team changed tactics and took control. The amount of penalty time we conceded was too great as the Germans pressed home their lead to win 16-8.

Everyone was bitterly disappointed at the result but victory wasn’t to be. After the presentation ceremony we returned to our rooms to get ready for the closing banquet in the function room of the police station (two Saturday nights running spent drinking in a police station, there’s something wrong with this picture). The banquet was excellent with five of our number being selected for the All-European team (Paul Terry, Dan Kallaugher, Ryan Pettit and the Beadle brothers, John and Matt). It ended a great week of lacrosse excellently hosted by Penarth LC and the Welsh LA.

So that’s what happened. The team disbanded on the Sunday, hopefully to reunite in the future for another challenge. Maybe, just maybe…

Thanks

On behalf of the team I would like to thank our coaching staff of Dave Hallows, Justin Camarda, Peter Compton, Denham Pope and Tom Warnes for all their tactical knowledge and encouragement during the week. Thank you also to all those supporters who travelled various distances to come and cheer us on during our matches.

A special thank-you must go to our man with the magic hands Steve Cluney. Without Steve there wouldn’t have been enough of us fit to field a team in the final. The whole team is deeply indebted to him for all his help and tireless work.

One last thank-you must go to Trevor Rogers, our team manager who organised everything from team uniform to getting together the team itself, all at short notice with a contagious energy that gave the team great self-belief.