M1 At Home To Hampstead On Saturday Evening
By Colin Pike
Surbiton Men play their final Men's Hockey League Premier Division fixture of Phase One when Hampstead & Westminster are the visitors to Sugden Road on Saturday evening.
As this weekend sees the final round of fixtures in Phase One, all games start at 1800.
Any supporters unable to get to Sugden Road for this fixture can watch the live stream via the Surbiton Hockey Club channel on You Tube here
Surbiton are currently third, having been overtaken by Holcombe following their 3-0 defeat at Old Georgians last Saturday. Surbiton could finish second, third or fourth depending on results, with Wimbledon level on points with Surbiton in fourth place.
If Holcombe beat Beeston, Surbiton can finish no higher than third, and if Wimbledon better Surbiton's result when they play at Old Georgians, then Wimbledon will finish third with Surbiton fourth.
Old Georgians will be favourites against Wimbledon having won all ten games this season to open up a five point lead over Holcombe, to guarantee that they will finish top of the table at the end of Phase One.
Hampstead are guaranteed to finish fifth, regardless of Saturday's result as they have an eight point advantage over sixth-placed Oxted and are four points behind both Surbiton and Wimbledon.
Hampstead started with a 3-1 win at East Grinstead and then drew 2-2 with Beeston. Holcombe won 3-2 at Paddington Recreation Ground before Hampstead won 8-0 at Bowdon.
Another away win at Southgate (5-2) was followed by a 2-1 home reverse to Wimbledon yet Hampstead maintained their excellent away record with a 7-1 win at Richmond. Hampstead finally won at home with a 6-1 victory against Cardiff & Met and then lost 5-0 at home to Old Georgians before winning 5-0 at Oxted last week.
Matt Guise-Brown is Hampstead's leading goalscorer on eight goals, closely followed by Josh Kelly on 7. Tim Guise-Brown has six to his name with Kiran Arunasalam on four. Kei Kaeppeler and Rupert Shipperley have both struck three times whilst Timothy Cross and James Oates have each scored twice.
Tim Crowson, Nicholas Steffens, Jolyon Morgan and Matt Richards have all found the net once this season to help Hampstead book their place in the Top Six.
Meetings between the teams go back to 1998-99 when they met in the second tier, but they have met twice for the league championship, Surbiton prevailing in a shootout 3-2 after a 3-3 draw in normal time in 2018 and Hampstead winning 3-1 in 2019.
The most recent meeting was at Surbiton in last season's League Finals semi-final when Surbiton won 4-1 before they lost 3-1 to Old Georgians in the final.
Surbiton saw Sam Ward score his 21st goal of the season in Old Georgians' win last Saturday, bur Surbiton's Struan Walker remains his nearest rival on 16 goals in the Premier Division goalscoring charts. Luke Taylor is on six with Jake Payton on five goals.
In other games, Oxted will be aiming to hold on to sixth place when they visit Richmond, but Cardiff & Met will be looking to pounce if Oxted slip up, with a home win over Bowdon. Beeston will want to spoil both Oxted and Cardiff's hopes by getting a result at Holcombe.
If Oxted, Beeston and Cardiff & Met all lose, East Grinstead could steal sixth place with a home win over Southgate.