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 HERTFORDSHIRE HOCKEY

Hockey in England has evolved over many years and has many historical boundaries, systems and competitions that make the hockey landscape a complicated one.  The pathway varies enormously, not only between boys and girls, but also from region to region and county to county.

The EHB started to introduce a single pathway from 2006. So what is the Single System? It is the development pathway for players, coaches and officials of all ages and abilities to reach their full potential.  It is based on a set of principles that puts the participant at the centre and is based on scientific research that has been widely accepted by the majority of other major sports within England. The pathway looks like this:

Junior Development Centres (JDC)

This is a new level of performance is designed to deliver the development of core skills above school and club at local training centres for boys and girls aged U13-U17 in any one calendar year. JDC’s are open to players nominated by schools and clubs with either current or potential talent in hockey or who played for the County in the previous year's Junior Academy Centre (JAC) squads, but were not nominated for Junior Regional Performance Centre (JRPC). Those players nominated by clubs and schools are then assessed using a 2.5 hour programme devised by our Director of Coaching. Based on their results of this assessment, players are invited to join a JDC squad.

Coaching will be delivered to an EHB syllabus by qualified coaches and in addition to training there will be festival competition between local county based JDC s. Following the JDC training and festival assessment, the best players will be nominated by coaches to attend JAC further assessment in January.

Hertfordshire are seeking to coach up to thirty six boys and thirty six girls in U13, U14 and combined U15/16 age groups in each of two centres spread across the county, on the dates given on the JDC Front page. An additional single combined boys and girls U17 age group will be run as well as two Goalkeeping groups for U13/U14 age groups and the U15/16/17 age group.

Talented U12’s will be accepted into the U13’s. Additionally the County wishes to run a single U12 Development Group consisting of 30 boys and 30 girls.

Junior Academy Centres (JAC)

This is the second step on the England Hockey Board’s developmental ladder and formerly county hockey. Nominated players from the JDCs and those county players who were at JRPC will receive further coaching in the core skills and match play from qualified coaches with competition between the JACs within regions. JACs will run from January to May in a given season.

Hertfordshire are seeking to coach approximately 30 boys and 30 girls in the U13 age group, and approximately 24 boys and 24 girls in the U14, U15, U16 and U17 age groups in training squads. Hertfordshire will operate a core squad policy of 8 players at U14, 15, 16 and17. Other members of the squad will rotate in the games to ensure that all members of the squad represent the county at least once. .All squads will participate in the Eastern Counties Championships. For the U13s, the County is looking to operate 2 squads. In addition, the County will actively pursue the possibility of additional matches against Counties outside of the Eastern Counties Region.

Following the JAC programme, coaches will nominate players to attend assessments for the Junior Regional Performance Centres (JRPC’s), a sub-regional level of development for potential full regional players. Selection into the full regional squads will lead to participation in the High Performance Camps (HiPACs) for U15 and U17 and the Futures Cup for the U16 and U18 age groups.

Hertfordshire Hockey Management Group

The 2009-2010 season saw the introduction of this system into Hertfordshire. The Hertfordshire Hockey Management Group is the sub committee responsible for the running of the elite system in the County.

This group is chaired by Richard West, who is the Chair of the County Association. One of the first acts of this group was to appoint Holloway Hockey to run the administration of single system in the county. The Group co-opted the 2 most well-known people in junior hockey in the county, Janette Wood and Graeme Welch, to provide their experience in this handover season. Simon Holloway as Director of Coaching for the County along Tom Godfrey as representative of the JDC and JAC Coaches sit on the body as well The final member is  Catherine Lymer, the County’s East Development officer.

For More Information Contact: Holloway Hockey- SSA

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Last modified: July 04, 2011