DUBAI Hosting it’s first ever tournament for youth, the Dubai Youth Hockey Club (DYHC) is determined to take the sport to the next level. Despite having a low presence in the UAE, organisers believe such tournaments will motivate many youngsters to pick up the sport in the future.
“We are on a mission to change it,” said Nadia Schwarz, coach and organiser of DYHC. “There is little There is little support for junior level hockey or just hockey in general at the moment, hence why I say it’s small, but Dubai Youth Hockey club now coaches 150+ children , and only started with 15 in 2012, so we are growing and I hope in time the Emirate will see a proper hockey pitch again as there used to be two at Sports City but they got replaced with ruby pitches as they were not making enough money which I understand from a business perspective as ruby here is massive in comparison to hockey. So of course I am hoping the More Dubai Youth Hockey Club Tournaments will help generate interest. There are also a few visiting teams that come out here in the cooler months from the UK that always want a game so there is of course lots of potential for the game to grow and prosper here. So if we can keep it all going along with the adult teams here maybe one day we can get a home for hockey which in turn would generate more interest in the game among the young and old as hockey is a game for everyone,” she added.
The More Dubai Youth Hockey Tournament will be held at Greenfields Community School in Dubai Investment Park on January 31 with 17 teams competing in different age categories.
Excited about hosting this event for the first time and is very thankful to More Café for stepping forward as the Event Sponsor and cannot thank Greenfields Community School enough for use of their pitch and all those within the hockey community here who have kindly said they will volunteer their time on the day.
“Youth hockey is small in Dubai, but I am really happy with the amount of teams who have entered, with around 170 children on the day playing” said Schwarz.
The tournament shall see a total of seventeen teams - four in the under 8’s, 6 in the under 11’s and 7 in the under 15’s and run from 9:00am until 4:30pm.
The tournament will see Horizon International School, Jumeirah English Speaking School, Repton, Victory Heights Primary and Dubai Youth Hockey Club compete in three different age divisions; Under 15’s, Under 11’s and Under 8’s in an outdoor 6-aside round-robin style field hockey tournament.
For more info email: dubaiyouthhockey@gmail.com or call 050 944 6172
