The Widnes Wild women’s team are recruiting for the 2018/19 season and are keen to attract new players as well as a new head coach. The Wild Women play in the EIHA’s Women’s Premier League and are the only women’s team in the north west to play at that national level.
They have been in the WPL for three seasons, qualified for the end of season play offs in two of those years and finished runners up in 2015/16.
While, obviously, wishing to remain competitive, the Wild women are keen to encourage new talent and nurture prospective players. As such, last season saw them hand WPL debuts to a number of players who had never played senior league hockey before, coming from backgrounds such as junior teams elsewhere, university hockey or even roller hockey.
There is a wide range of ages and experience on the current Wild women roster with players aged from 15 to 60 - and seasoned internationals sharing line duties with season debutants.
Wild women training starts again in August and prospective new players are asked to get in touch with the team via Facebook or Twitter.
Facebook: www.facebook.com/widneswildwomen
Twitter: www.twitter.com/widneswildwomen
The Wild women are also looking for a new Head Coach for the 2018/19 season.
The requirements are as follows:
Must hold a valid EIHA Level 2 licence.
Ability to plan and lead weekly training sessions, with the support of Assistant Coaches.
Available to travel with the team to bench coach a 14-game season (7x home, 7x away).
Once again, interested parties are invited to contact the team via Facebook or Twitter:
Facebook: www.facebook.com/widneswildwomen
Twitter: www.twitter.com/WidnesWildWomen
On A Personal Note:
A lot of people don’t realise there is such a thing as women’s ice hockey and those who do are often disparaging about it for one reason or another.
I have always been interested in women’s hockey – dating right back to the days in the 1980s when the Peterborough Ravens were early English league champions. In fact, the rec team that I used to play for had regular "friendly" games against the Ravens - although these were anything but friendly and usually ended up with us getting battered both physically and score-wise!
Women’s hockey isn’t quite that aggressive these days and is played on a "non-checking" basis. While it may come across as tame in comparison with men’s league games, this means that there is a lot more emphasis on skating, passing and positioning techniques, which in a lot of ways makes the games more interesting. There are not so much stoppages, less niggly posturing and arguing and the game flows much more freely.
I have been reporting on the Wild women’s games since they started playing at Widnes three years ago and can safely say that I enjoy those matches just as much as the Wild NIHL games.
If you have the chance to go and watch a women’s game at your local rink, do go along and give them your support. There are many women’s teams across the country playing in Elite League, Premier League and D1 North & South and also U16s teams in some areas as well.
Paul Breeze
