Over 100 people crowded into the White Rose Reception Centre on Saturday night the 5th of May to celebrate 45 years for the mighty La Trobe University Hockey Club, the ‘Gunners’.
The Club was joined on the night by Club Patron and Member for Bundoora, Colin Brooks MLA, also Member for Northern Metropolitan, Jenny Mikakos MLC and Ben Hartung, CEO of Hockey Victoria.
“We greatly appreciated Colin, Jenny and Ben joining us to celebrate a great milestone for our club” President Zac Martin said.
“We are the largest competitive sporting club at La Trobe University, we have over 15 registered competitive teams who participate in active competitions with Hockey Victoria each weekend, this includes 5 senior Women’s teams, 6 senior Men’s teams, Junior’s teams and a Master’s team .
“It is an outstanding testament to Hockey at La Trobe University that our Women’s first XI compete in the State League 2 Division in Victoria, higher than both Melbourne and Monash University”.
The night celebrated the great careers of a number of club stalwarts. Greg Van Meeuwen, who has recently been selected to compete for Australia in the Masters Games in Manchester England, was made the 15th Life member of the Club.
In addition Ross Erickson, ‘the father’ of the club, was made the first ever recipient of the ‘President’s Plate’ an award that recognises Ross’s 40 years of continued service to the club, starting back when he was a student in the early 70’s.
“The club is the biggest and most successful it has ever been in its history, we have a record number of women playing and a record number of students, we greatly appreciate all the assistance we receive from the University and most particularly the staff at the La Trobe Sports Centre.” said Mr Martin.
“We look forward in the next 12 months to securing a new hockey turf on campus at La Trobe and working together with Melbourne Heart FC to provide a sports hub at the University for students and the local community”.