Fr Eric Vaz Memorial Hockey Tournament

The Fr Eric Vaz Memorial (Under 14) and the Centenary Shield (Under 17) Interschool Tournaments were held from 1st to 13th July 2016. A total of seven teams participated in the U-17 category and five teams in the U-14 category. All the matches were held in the Hockey Stadium, Rhenius Street, Langford Town, Bengaluru.

The officials for conducting the matches were from the Karnataka State Hockey Federation. Matches were played on league cum knock out basis where the top two teams entered the knock out stage.

There was a healthy competition between all the teams. It was good to see the enthusiasm among the boys to play in these prestigious tournaments. SJBHS, FAPS, Vidya Shilp Academy and Bishop Cottons Boys’ School entered the knock-out stage in the U-14 category. SJBHS, Baldwin Boys High School, Vidya Shilp Academy and Sarala Birla Academy entered the knock-out stage in the U-17 category.

Vidya Shilp Academy and SJBHS entered the finals in the both U-14 and U-17 category where they played each other on the final day of the tournament.

There were a host of distinguished guests attending the finals: Mr. Bharat Chettri, former Captain and Goal Keeper of the Indian team, Mr Dave Stain Forth, Olympian from South Africa, Mr. Piyush Kumar and Mr. P. T. Rao, both Coaches who have produced many National and International hockey players for India. Mr. Raghu Prasad, the only Umpire from Karnataka to officiate in the Rio Olympics 2016, officiated our final match.

We also had our former Principal Rev Fr Hedwig Da Costa SJ who started the Fr Eric Vaz Memorial Tournament along with our Principal Rev Fr Clifford Sequeira SJ, to witness the finals. Stds IX and X along with quite a number of enthusiastic Old Boys, teachers and parents were there to cheer.

SJBHS blanked Vidya Shilp Academy 4:0 in the U-14 finals to lift the Fr Erc Vaz Memorial Trophy. Carlin Joseph was declared the ‘Best Half’ and Jason Samuel was adjudged ‘Player Of the Tournament’. They also received a cash prize of Rs. 1000 from the Chief Guest for their outstanding performance in the finals.

In the U-17 category, Vidya Shilp Academy pipped SJBHS 4:3 in a penalty shoot out to emerge Champions and lift the Centenary Shield. It was an electrifying match. After 50 minutes of regulation time, the scores was 1:1. Dhruv Mendens was awarded the ‘Best Back’ and Nishanth P was adjudged ‘Player Of the Tournament’.