Eighteen seasons and taking part in a cumulative 88 EHL Males’s video games between them, one anomaly will lastly finish on October 3rd when Spanish giants Actual Membership de Polo meet HC Bloemendaal for the primary time within the competitors’s historical past.
For Polo’s talisman Xavi Lleonart, it will likely be a particular showdown, lining out in opposition to the aspect with whom he performed the main position in 2018 to win gold sporting the famed orange shirt.
Again with Polo, he’s hoping a few of his inside information will assist the Spanish membership give you a recreation plan to unlock Bloemendaal.
“I’m fortunate as a result of I’ve been on each side,” he advised the EHL web site. “On paper, they’re the favourites – in fact, we all know that. However that is KO16 and knock-out hockey so that you all the time need to carry out and be in fine condition on that day.
“If we play with our weapons, we’ve got an opportunity to beat them, in fact, and we’re actually assured.Completely, we favor to play in opposition to groups like this and it means we should give our 100%!”
There stay loads of hyperlinks between Lleonart’s time within the Netherlands, not least with Michel van den Heuvel again as coach of the membership having held the reins to their 2018 success.
Jasoer Brinkman and Floris Wortelboer additionally traverse the vintages together with Yannick van der Drift following two seasons in Barcelona with Polo.
Within the remaining, Lleonart’s blockbuster backhand shot was an important factor of their comeback win over SV Kampong.
“The reminiscences are wonderful,” he mirrored. “I used to be making an attempt to win the EHL for thus a few years with Polo and it was actually troublesome. With Bloemendaal, I knew that there was a transparent alternative to win it; the group at the moment was virtually an All-Stars [also featuring Jamie Dwyer, Florian Fuchs and Thierry Brinkman among others].
“The ultimate in opposition to Kampong was brutal by way of depth and by way of rivalry. Now, they’ve Michel once more however they’re additionally a very completely different group.
“I do know Michel’s fashion, I do know what he needs, the depth and the identification that they are going to have. It’s going to be a extremely troublesome recreation for us. They’re actually proficient gamers with plenty of expertise, with a lot rhythm that they’ll get from the Dutch league.
“We should survive these first minutes, making an attempt to adapt to their depth or their rhythm. As soon as that first stage is completed, we should play our hockey to beat them.”
As Bloemendaal have modified, so have Polo. Lengthy-time Egara man Ramon Sala is now within the teaching position, taking on from Carlos Garcia Cuenca who’s now with the Spanish girls’s group full-time having executed each roles final season.
4 key additions have joined with a very German flavour: Teo Hinrichs from Mannheimer HC, Benedikt Schwarzhaupt from UHC Hamburg, Robert Duckscheer from HTC Uhlenhorst Mülheim together with Arnau de Bruijn from Junior FC.
On the flip aspect, 9 gamers have moved on from their panel, notably Marc Reyné to Braxgata; Marc Recasens to HGC and Van Drift to Bloemendaal whereas Pablo de Abadal, Àlex Reyne, Llorenç Piera and Vicenç Ruiz have retired.
Nonetheless, they began the Spanish league on a profitable word and so they have large challenges in opposition to Membership de Campo and Membership Egara within the coming week to set them up.
“It’s true that it’s a very new group with a brand new employees and Ramon, we’re build up the group once more. I feel the issues are going fairly properly. He is aware of the Spanish league in and out and helps us construct a brand new identification.
“With three new gamers from Germany, they bring about utterly completely different kinds so they’re making an attempt to adapt to the Spanish fashion. We’re assured by the KO16 time, the group can be performing fairly properly. That’s our predominant aim to construct rapidly so the group arrive in London with the group able to carry out.”
With Lleonart on board, they will even have a wealth of data to attract and be taught from, one thing which he additionally shared with the broader world this summer time in the course of the Olympic Video games.
His insights X (Twitter) have been an enchanting perception from a high participant, elevating observations and questions on the important thing speaking factors, one thing he reckons he’ll give extra of if the viewers wills it.
“Actually, I acquired this query many occasions over the last month,” when requested whether or not it’s one thing he plans to develop.
“It’s true that I like to observe each single hockey recreation and I attempted to provide my opinion [particularly on the Spanish performances]. I feel the Olympic Video games are a contest all people on the planet is following, not solely the hockey followers but additionally different sports activities followers and I acquired plenty of engagement.
“That’s one thing that tells us hockey has plenty of potential. I simply thought it was actually attention-grabbing as a result of we don’t typically get so many of those type of voices type of voices.
“I feel it could be attention-grabbing to produce other gamers or different folks from hockey giving their opinion as a result of properly it’s a extremely essential sport and I want to create this neighborhood!”