Youth Tournament
The BBLeys Youth Tournament was a great success. The Tornadoes where narrowly beaten to the cup, but the whole event went very well. Due to the Lottery grant, sponsorship, side shows and entry fees, the club is now about £1800 pounds richer!

Seniors
The seniors suffered from the exodus of players to Gosford at the start of the season. Many of the remaining players are still developing, but are all enjoying themselves and developing teamwork and team spirit.

Now that the team is gelling, we have actually started winning games. We beat Loddon valley and Gosford more times this season than they beat us.

Some new players look like joining us for next year. If we can just field all our registered players each match, there is no reason why we cant win next year.

Junior
The Juniors finished third in the league, despite being very short handed toward the end of the season. The Juniors should be in better shape next year with many of the current youth team being able to play up.

Youth Team
The Tornadoes Youth team are un-defeated in the league, and so go to the nationals on 16h 18h of November. The Youth team are very well placed for next year. With only a few players moving up to Junior, they will be a battle hardened team who should be able to take on anyone!

Youth Coach Aldie writes:
I'm very, very excited about the Nationals this year, our Youth team hopefully will cause a few upsets. Our players have a lot of talent and spirit and as they're recent performances against the Welsh select squad showed. We played them twice and drew twice, despite the fact that they were all top age Youth and much bigger than us bigger headed too!

I am even more excited about next year's youth team. I predict that we will win the National Championships and then go on to win the European Championships. I also predict that we will be undefeated in all games where we field our full strength team.

PeeWees
The Oxford storm are the largest team in the club, and amongst the most enthusiastic! They have progressed well over the year and where narrowly beaten to third place in the regionals, missing their chance to go to the Nationals.

Minnows
Oxford have a thriving minnows team, due to the efforts of Sue Edwards and Dave Flavell. Unfortunately, not many other clubs support a minnows team and so our minnows have had few matches. However, because of the few minnow clubs around, they qualify for the Nationals in Blackpool on Sunday 2nd December . Come on you Blues...!

Minnows are the future of the sport and the club. Any player starting from Minnow age has a definite edge over players who have started later.

We have a poster to put up to attract more players. Please make sure one is up in your school.

Second hand Kit
The website has a list of kit that is also on the notice board at ferry. If you have any thing to sell, let either Jannine or Richard know, and it will get included. Or think about donating kit that could help newcomers to start playing.

Sam Bourgein - Get well soon
Sam, the youth top goal scorer, has broken his upper arm playing Ice Hockey just a week before he was due to play in the Youth National championships. Get well soon Sam.

Medals
Make sure you’ve got your BISHA medals. Those that didn’t make it to the presentation still get a medal- there should be one for everyone. Ask your manager.

Membership
Membership is due for renewal soon. Players must also be members of Bisha to play in league matches. Membership is £5 for renewal and £20 for new members.

Be a web master!
Any one can create their own web pages at OXSKATE.COM Its easy. Just put together a document, pictures, logos, any thing you want, as a computer file and send it to me at richardg@ovation.co.uk. If your word processor can save as HTML then great, send me that. If not, send what you can and I'll format it up for you. If you don't know how, I can help. It would be great to see contributions, so give it a go!

E-mails: be @oxskate.com
E-mails are revolutionising communication. To help the club talk, we will soon have an E-mail forwarding system, that allows any e-mail to a club member to be re-directed anywhere else. So, if someone doesn't know the proper e-mail address of , say, Mervyn, just use mervyn@oxskate.com and it will get automatically forwarded to his 'real' email address. The forwarding system will be loaded with all members names and most members recognisable shorter names. If you think your e-mail address is not included, or has changed, or you want to use a different name, then email Richard Gregory at richardg@ovation.co.uk.

The Chairman
A big thank you to the committee, parents and players for helping the club to run smoothly this year. Well done to all teams, especially those short handed. Have a nice holiday, happy Christmas and look forward to next season - Mervyn.

Treasurers Report

Club finances are in a healthy state. This is due to the efforts of those who obtain sponsorship and income for the club. Special thanks are due to Janine, whose tireless efforts has meant that we go into 2002 and the New Year with the bank account in a reasonable condition. The youth tournament was particularly successful, due in part to sponsorship but also to those who manned stalls, cooked barbecues, humped bags in the kit store (!) Etc.

No treasurer's report would be complete without some gloom and despondency. Some of the training sessions are losing money due to non-attendance of players. Please make all efforts to attend training sessions as the club will not be able to afford them in the future once these sessions are lost, it is often difficult to get them back as other organisations are ready to step into our slots!

Next year's regionals
The 2002 regional championships are returning to Farnborough. This means a 70 minute journey each way. On the plus side, the facilities there are excellent with a swimming pool, other sports facilities and an ASDA opposite.

It has been strongly represented to SASH to try and run two matches per team with an hour break in between. This should half the total traveling required. It has also been suggested that we keep games for a particular club together If all these recommendations are implemented then the regionals could have a tournament like atmosphere that would be beneficial to clubs and the game. We live in hope.

The regionals start again on the 9th of February. The SASH refs have given players notice that red card match penalties will be enforced next year. This means offending players can be suspended from further games until the 'proper authorities have dealt with the case'. Be warned.

Coaches course
To a large extent, the club revolves around Aldie and his dedication to the sport and the kids. Because he is so tireless, we haven't needed many any other coaches to regularly help out. So, out goes the call to any elder players and parents to volunteer to join in a coaches course.

Aldie Writes:
I will be running a course which is in the development stage at the moment. It will be roughly based on the better courses that I have attended in the past and it will be adjusted to suit the Oxford Blues club in particular. I'd like the course to be open to all parents and players who feel they might benefit from knowing how the Oxford players are being trained as well as those who would like to actually assist in the coaching. The initial course will last about 4 hours with breaks. For those wishing to assist with coaching, there will be an exam which participants will have two weeks to complete and return. If they pass, they will receive an Oxford Blues Coaching Qualification Level One.

Club Posters
We have a poster that lets people know what a great sport and a great club we have, and invites them to join us.. Please ask for some copies and put them up in all the sports/leisure centres, schools, youth clubs, etc, that you can think of.

Bales is a Ref.
Yes, one more person to hurl abuse at. Bales has qualified as a ref on the second attempt. Qualifying as a ref is not easy. Being a ref is not easy, but the club needs more refs. If any one else fancies having a go, then SASH/Bisha organise courses every 6 months or so. The club will pay the course fees if necessary.

Youth Nationals - High hopes dashed
The youth team went to the national championships in Blackpool with high hopes, but things just didn't go to plan. Sam Bourgein broke his arm, Richard Grandi couldn't make it and to top it all Aldie’s van broke down on the way there with 6 player passengers. We lost 5 of our 6 games and finished 16th overall (out of 16!). We had the control of play but just couldn't finish- things can only get better....

Better luck next year..

Minnows - The birth of The Newbury Colts.
Although there are a number of skater hockey clubs in our area, only Oxford Blues can field a full Minnows team. This means that many minnow aged players in our area who are not members of Oxford Blues, don't have any matches to play in.

This problem has been tackled by Sue Edwards who has initiated a SASH area minnows training session, coached by Aldie Chalmers. This has been run at Newbury at the Northcroft center and at Greenham common. Aldie has been picking up on individual weaknesses and organised training to suit. Training ends in scrimmaging to enable players to get used to playing together and working as a team. The parents were fully supportive and the players have really enjoyed the training sessions. The combined team is the Newbury Colts. It comprises 5 Oxford blues players, 3 Northcroft Knights, 2 Shene Youngbloods and 2 Reading Rhinos players.

The Colts First tournament
The Newbury Colts where offered a place to play in the Doncaster Bircotes Bombers Inline Hockey Tournament in September. Parents and players were ecstatic with the prospect of the team not only playing their first game together, but in an actual tournament. No one could have hoped for a better start for a new side.

Newbury Colts won 3, lost 2 finishing third in our group. A very good first tournament result. Well done to all our players. Sue and Dave were very proud of you all. Congratulations to the host club for such a fantastic tournament, and to the helpers for all their help and friendship.

The Wheatley Park Piranhas
Some of the players at Wheatley park have organised themselves into a youth team, from the scrimmage session at Saturday nights. The Piranhas will be playing in the SASH league for 2002. Good luck to them.

On Sunday 4th November, the Tornadoes (Youth) took part in a three way friendly competition at Wheatley Park with the Piranhas and Gosford's Youth team. It was a good chance for some of the Tornadoes to play on a big court (41metres x 21 metres) prior to the Nationals. We also fielded a line of Pee Wees who will be playing at Youth level next year. The first game we played was against the Piranhas and we beat them by 8 goals to nil in a 2 x 14 minute game. Even the Pee Wee line scored a couple of goals showing that they are looking good for Youth next year.

We won our other game against Gosford by 8 goals to 2.

By the way, Teroa (Tiger) Hedges played in goals for the Tornadoes. As usual he was brilliant especially when you consider that he is only a second year Pee Wee who won't be eligible to play Youth for another year! In the third game of the day, Gosford beat the Piranhas, 2 0.

The Wheatley court was brilliant and hopefully we'll be able to play a few more friendly games here in the future. Thanks to Richard Gregory for Refereeing and Karen (Bails) Bailey for timekeeping and to (Big) Brucie Hedges for playing in goal for the Piranha team.

Conduct
The club has a code of conduct and a constitution that all members must abide by. In addition to this 'official code', there is an unwritten code of conduct that underpins the way all club members should behave. How we treat each other, our team, our club and the sport. The club's aim is to promote sportsmanship and clubmanship amongst its members, and to encourage that feeling of team spirit where team members support and encourage each other in the pursuit of their common goal. We also aim to win games and be a bloody good club to belong to!

The biggest cause of friction within the club (any club) can be said to be apparent selfish behavior, that doesn't get dealt with by proper communication. Unfortunately, the result of bad behavior, and/or the lack of communication can result in damaging rifts forming within the club. Sometimes the guilty party(s) can be unaware of the damage done and of the consequences. This article is to highlight some of the damage that can be done by various acts. This isn't a sideways dig at anyone, but we should all look at our consciences and all decide to be better people as a result!

Problems caused by players leaving clubs for another.
This has a major effect on overall club moral especially when it occurs from the older end of the club, and by the choice of the players concerned.

It takes the wind out of peoples sails.
It takes a lot of effort from a lot of people to make a club successful including fund raising, coaching, managing, collecting money, finances, arranging halls, practices, matches, traveling, etc, etc. A lot of players don't think about this or realise that this is done for the club and will naturally take it for granted. Over the years many good people have given up because they felt it just wasn't worth it they were totally unappreciated by the people who benefitted from their hard work. When enough key players and people leave, a club may never recover momentum and could eventually fold, which ultimately benefits no one. This does happen We must make sure it never happens to Oxford Blues.

Stops the club improving
When players leave because they are unhappy with any aspect of the club, the matter doesn't get fixed. Whatever the problem was, it will remain for the other members. If the player doesn't talk the problem through, then the problem cannot be fixed.

Stop the teams from ever reaching a high level
Iif players leave because they think that the club is not good enough for them, then it becomes self fulfilling that the club will not get good enough to hold on to the better players. There are many excellent examples of players who stick with a club to raise its standards. Those people give far more to the game and get far more out of the game, than those who follow whichever team happens to be scoring well that season

Destroys club spirit
A club is made up of individuals working together to allow players to play the game they love. This is the natural continuation of the team ethic. When an individual is just out for themselves and this is accepted as normal (or 'not so bad'), others will naturally adopt it and pretty soon we have a bunch of individuals working entirely for the good of themselves without any consideration for others. It doesn't work for the good of the team and it doesn't work for a good club.

Give away team tactics
Players leaving a club damage and weaken the effectiveness of the tactics that have been taught to the remaining team.

Generate negative feelings
Players leaving a club for selfish reasons generate ill feeling amongst those who remain who have sacrificed time effort and dedication towards their development.

Encourage bad sportsmanship
Leaving a team for selfish reasons rewards the team doing the poaching, and encourages them to damage other clubs by similar actions. This cannot be good for the sport and for the development of those involved.

Cuts both ways
These points apply equally to any player considering joining Oxford Blues from another team. Players joining Oxford should consider and take into account the potential harm that leaving their club can do to their club and to their own development.

Problems caused be negative criticism
Players play and officials officiate because they want to. They like the sport and they like the company. They are not professional and do not have to take any abuse from anyone. Players, coaches, managers, officials and parents all have an opinion and we all express it from various viewpoints, in various ways and with varying effectiveness. Criticism should always be positive and constructive and delivered with respect. Specific examples that do cause problems are:

Player vs Player.
We are an inclusive club. This includes beginners, intermediates and super heroes. There is nothing more destructive than negative criticism from fellow players. A single comment 'you're crap'(or similar), to a struggling player could be all it takes to never see him(her) playing in the club again even if it was delivered as a 'joke'. Be positive even if the player is crap - encourage and lead by example. Players who give genuine positive comments and advice are respected and listened to. This is the stuff that great teams are built of.

Player vs Official
Officials, Managers, Coaches are there for the good of the team and are there to hold the team together. If players have a grievance with an official, then don't keep it to yourself. Worse still don't just share it only amongst a select group of other players. Let it out and talk it through communicate. Team work is about communication, without communication, we are not a team.

Parents vs Official
'My son was hardly on that match!' 'Why do you favor your own son' . The dreaded parental barracking feared by all managers! Managers have a tough job, trying to win matches and be fair to the up and coming players. Give them some leeway, even if it is annoying to make all the effort to get to a match and only see the player on for ' a few minutes'. Of course, if the game wasn't close, and little Johnny did get totally overlooked, then fair enough give 'em hell!

Its good to talk
If any one has a problem within the club, talk it through with someone. We have a players reps for each team, we have team managers, we have a committee and we have Mervyn (who will wear his underpants on the outside and fly in to right wrongs at a moments notice on second thoughts, cancel that image!).

Don't let problems fester - talk them out. Communicate.The Oxford Blues is a great club and will go on to greater greatness as long as petty politics and selfish behavior isn't taken as the norm.

The Oxford Blues SHC