Field Clubs

Field Clubs

Trinity College Badminton Club Chloé Caron (2017) & Sylvia Ma (2018)

Overcoming the difficult circumstances surrounding the current situation, Trinity College Badminton Club has been able to persevere and succeed both in improving players’ skills and creating a bond throughout the Club. Even with the restrictions, we have enjoyed a strong intake of new players with brilliant turnout to both training and coaching sessions. Throughout these sessions, we saw impressive improvements within the three men’s teams and the two women’s teams.

Due to restrictions, the College Badminton Women’s and Open leagues were both cancelled a few weeks into the Michaelmas term. However, the women’s first team was able to take an impressive victory against Jesus before the competition was cancelled. Although Cuppers was also cancelled, we are looking forward to next year and to see the phenomenal improvements of our players being put to the test. Although also limited to the Michaelmas term, it was wonderful to see members of all teams attending coaching sessions with Jack Curtis and seeing them flourish over time. On a more international level, the weekly strength and conditioning sessions with Harry Vesey were a great way to keep up with exercising while keeping in touch with the team through Zoom! This year, the Field Club colours were awarded to Yi Wen from the women’s side and Jan Petr from the men’s side for their great dedication to training.

We look forward to building on this year’s success and recruiting more players next year. As the lockdown restrictions continue to be eased, we are eager to start welcoming players back to the court and to participate once again in intercollegiate competitions.

Trinity Climbing

Valentin Imbach (2019)

Given the difficult circumstances caused by the ongoing pandemic, the past year has been a successful one for the Trinity Climbing Society. We recruited many freshers in the virtual Freshers’ Fair in October, and we managed to get some new faces joining our weekly bouldering sessions at the Kelsey Kerridge climbing

centre during the Michaelmas term. Many of the freshers had never climbed before, and the two captains for this year, Matyas Sago and Valentin Imbach, were very proud to see them all improve remarkably whilst enjoying the sport to its fullest. We also organised a couple of bouldering sessions at Rainbow Rocket, another climbing centre a bit further away from College.

Unfortunately, due to sport centres closing during lockdown and other COVIDrelated restrictions, climbing was not possible during the latter two terms of the year, and we did not get much time to get to know each other properly. Likewise, it was not possible to organise any climbing trips away from Cambridge, and social activities had to be kept to a minimum as well. We did however make the most out of the time we got to spend on the wall together and are looking forward to continuing in what we hope will be a normal next year.

Trinity Men’s and Mixed Hockey

Tristan Spreng (2019) The academic year 2020–21 was another hugely successful year for the TrinityFitzwilliam ‒ ‘Titz’ for short ‒ Hockey Team. This season, a major change to the rules was proposed to minimise transmission of the COVID virus: namely a change from eleven players on each side to seven. Participation in the Michaelmas league was stellar, as the Titz team was able to put out full men’s and mixed teams each weekend. The men’s team dominated Catz in their first game with an 8–1 win, thanks to a beautiful team effort and goals from Liam Brown, Richard Chappell and others. Our next match was against St John’s. It offered good hockey on both sides in the first half, and we were able to bring home a 2–1 win after a heated and emotional second half.

The mixed team, led by Grace Montague-Fuller, drew against St John’s/Newnham on the first weekend. Including a substantial proportion of freshers, our mixed team took the first few games to become familiar with each other and develop a team spirit. Their efforts culminated in a 5–0 win against Jesus, traditionally one of the strongest teams, with excellent performances by Gabrielle Doyle and Juvraj Singh. The highlights in the remaining league on the men’s side were a hard-fought 3–2 victory against Jesus and a more easy-going 8–1 win against Selwyn. With rising numbers of COVID cases across the country and an increasing number of self-isolating students, the league was suspended after the fourth match day on 1

COLLEGE ACTIVITIES Men’s Hockey Team 2020/21.From left to right: Richard Chappell, Gabriel Kerwick, Liam Brown, Thomas Newton, Henry King, Conor Rees, Tristan Spreng, Matty Lear.

November. It was announced that the standings in the league tables at this point were the final results, making the Titz men’s team the winners of their league with five wins out of seven matches and an unbelievable goal difference of +21, higher than that of any other team! The mixed team came sixth (out of eight) in the first mixed league.

After several long and painful months without College hockey ‒ and indeed without being in Cambridge for most of us ‒ we were allowed to settle back into College in mid-April. After realising that there was still an ardent desire amongst the teams for some sort of College hockey during Easter term, the league committee drew up fixtures for a Cuppers tournament: i.e. a single-elimination tournament to be played over four weekends. Since some of our players fell victim to increasing exam pressure, we joined together the men’s and mixed teams for this tournament.

Right at the start, we faced Downing ‒ the only team we did not defeat back in Michaelmas ‒ in an interesting and hard-fought match. Our team started off strongly, not irritated by the fact that Downing had a blues player on their team, and we had a 2–1 lead at half-time. Courtesy of some solo runs and good stick skill by the opposing team’s blues player, we conceded three goals in the second

half despite excellent defensive efforts by Titz. Special mention goes out to Joe Uprichard, who literally put his head on the block by defending a powerful reverse stick shot with his head, thereby preventing another goal. We went on to win the next match with a very solid 7–1 score line against Clare, who offered minimal resistance against our forceful attacking.

On the third weekend, we faced Catz, the match ending 3–3 after regular time. To determine a winner, a so-called crossbar challenge was held: both teams try to hit the crossbar of the hockey goal from the seven-metre point. Whilst hitting the crossbar is already quite hard to achieve in soccer, it happens once in a blue moon in hockey. Both teams appointed five players to take their chance. The first six players did not score, then the Titz captain walked up to the seven-metre point and hammered the ball against the crossbar. The game was over, and we were happy that this was the closest we ever came to being defeated in the later parts of the Cuppers competition. We concluded the tournament with a fun game against Emmanuel/Murray Edwards, which left us victorious with a seven-point lead.

This year has challenged us students in many ways, and we had to adapt to many new circumstances. It is thus a source of consolation to see that at least one thing stayed exactly the same as in the previous years ‒ the fact that Titz is at the very top of College hockey. I am sure that the effort every one of us has put in this year will help propel Trinity hockey to even greater heights next season!

Trinity College Mixed Netball Team

Roly Peel (2019) and Franck Davis (2019) Over the past few years, Trinity College Mixed Netball Club has gone from strength to strength, and we are proud to say that this year has been no different. Despite some senior players graduating last year, we retained a strong foundation for the team with previous captains Sam Bealing and Marc Bonaventura providing invaluable skill and support. The enthusiasm for mixed netball at the start of the year could be felt everywhere, and nearly thirty freshers turned up for the first training session during Freshers’ Week. With some extremely talented new players joining the side, it was clear that we had the makings of an excellent team.

In Michaelmas we had a string of successes in the League, losing only narrowly to Jesus in what proved to be one of the best games of netball anyone present

had seen in a while. Unfortunately, the League was cut short with the November lockdown, but it was an impressive start to the season and demonstrated the potential that our team had. Never before has the Mixed Netball Club done weekly training sessions, but such was the enthusiasm and excitement for netball that we decided to start some sessions this year to whet the appetite for netball.

It was of course a huge disappointment to lose out on a whole term of netball in Lent. However, it was a testament to the character of our team that as soon as we returned in Easter, everyone was eager to get back on court. Another friendly league was organised, and Trinity College Mixed Netball Club rose to the occasion. Perhaps most importantly, this included a much-anticipated victory against Jesus of 23–18, meaning we also beat them on aggregate throughout the year. It shows our growth as a team that we were able to improve throughout the year and finally produce a match-winning performance against them. Having won three out of our four league games during Easter term we ended up joint top of the league, meaning that we can be proud of our achievements on court in what has been an exceptionally trying year for any sports team.

It goes without saying that this year has been unlike any other: we never had the opportunity to face up to Christ Church again, there have been fewer social opportunities, the league was abruptly ended in Michaelmas and was on a smaller scale in Easter, and there was no Cuppers. We can, however, be extremely proud

The winning team for our 23–18 victory against Jesus.

of our work as a team. Many people arrive at Trinity having never played netball before, so the fact that we consistently put out such a competitive side is fantastic. The future of the Mixed Netball Club looks in safe hands with various freshers injecting excellent hustle and enthusiasm onto the court. And perhaps most importantly of all: Cuppers was never played, meaning we retain it for yet another year and have therefore held the Cuppers trophy for the past four years!

We are so proud to hand over the captaincy to James Critchley and Clodagh Bottomley, two freshers who have proven themselves throughout the year on and off the court. We wish them all the best in the role, and with any luck they will be able to lead Trinity College Mixed Netball Club to yet another Cuppers win.

Trinity College Women’s Netball Club

Elizabeth Beevers (2019)

Trinity College Women’s Netball Club took the league by storm this year. If the girls were not in their rooms isolating from a track and trace gone wrong, they were out on the netball pitch come rain or shine wreaking havoc on the selfesteem of the unsuspecting teams of Collegiate Netball Division 3. With our touring dates limited to Michaelmas and Easter term, so too were our chances to show off our new-found fervour for winning. Following the addition of young talent to the ranks of those in higher years, it was through skill, determination and the promise of a post-match hot chocolate that the Trinity girls showed that we can do more than just top Tripos.

This season we were proud to walk away with a total of three wins, one draw and just one loss. After our usual warm up lap of the courts and a game of piggyin-the-middle to get us in the spirit, we often began our games by allowing the opposing side to win the first two quarters. Some may think that we failed properly to warm up; you cannot blame the untrained eye for drawing such layman’s conclusions. More than netball players, we are strategists. A tactical lulling of our opponents into a false sense of security in the first two quarters, only to rip apart their hopes, dreams and aspirations in the remaining fourteen minutes, made the victory all the sweeter.

The third quarter was always exhilarating. Following our animalistic chant, “ONE, TWO, THREE, TRINITYYYY”, it was at this point that our defenders

Top row: Katherine Setna (Vice Captain), Sophie Williams, Poppy Haward, Isi McPartlin, Charlotte Morris, Nancy Tupling, Amy Migz. Bottom row: Gabrielle Doyle, Elizabeth Beevers (Captain), Olivia Young, Katie Freeman.

(Nancy, Liv, Katie and Pops) would activate their intercepting skills, our attackers (Gabby, Isi, Amy and Katherine) would launch the ball down the court in swift, swan-like motions and our shooters (Sophie and Charlotte) would start sinking the ball into the net the way we sank our pints the night before. Following the new-found lead by the end of the third quarter, the girls were reminded that the score was still “0–0” and that now was not the time to rest on our laurels. We were not Milan, and this was not Istanbul. In true Trinity fashion, the final quarter was a show of pomp, pride and glory, and Grange Road was our arena. As the girls got stronger and more agile, the opposing side’s skill would decline as each goal by our nearly -six-foot, merciless shooters would ebb away at any ounce of confidence they once had.

Celebrations ended with a group photo, an elbow tap and commiserations for the losing team and a victory hot chocolate with cream from the bar. All stashed up, we walked through College triumphant, and shamelessly bathed in the porters’ half-hearted felicitations. In such a turbulent year, it was an absolute pleasure to be Captain. The team spirit, giggles and genuine friendship amongst the girls made our weekly netball matches into a sort of pause from the outside world. A big thank you in particular to my Vice-Captain, Katherine, and I look forward to seeing the girls storm Division 2 next year.

Trinity Table Tennis

Dani Simon (2018)

2020–21 was a difficult year for Trinity Table Tennis in the middle of a pandemic. For a large proportion of the time, indoor activities (including our sport) were prohibited or were allowed only with limitations. Unfortunately, the College League had to be cancelled too this year; probably for the first time ever we did not have league matches to look forward to each week. We had a really strong team but sadly we did not have a league in which to compete.

Despite all this, we were motivated to keep the Club alive, so Timour Antonov (the other captain) and I decided to hold weekly training sessions whenever regulations allowed. In Michaelmas we even held two training sessions each week, which hopefully everyone enjoyed, and we had quite a good number of people turning up regularly. The focus on these sessions was mainly on having fun, but I also tried to do coaching for people who needed it.

In Lent term we were not allowed to play at all. In Easter term, Timour ran some training while I was in my home country. Karl Paul Parmakson played in the Varsity first team against Oxford, and I played in the Varsity second team, so we probably would have had a chance to win the league if it had taken place.

We are looking forward to next year and hoping that we can have regular sessions again, and that we can do serious training for the upcoming College League. We will be able to achieve good results next year if the situation improves, so we (as everyone else) hope for a COVID-free 2021–22. I can only finish with a thank you to all the people who attended our training this year ‒ you made this strange year a little bit more normal by making the weekly sessions worth attending.