Women's Hockey European Cup Winners' Cup: Loreto guaranteed themselves at least a silver medal at the European Cup Winners' Cup in Vienna yesterday when they made it three wins out of three to top their pool and set up a gold medal play-off today against Italian side Lorenzoni.
Saturday's 3-1 win over Royal Leopold of Belgium and yesterday's 4-2 defeat of Cardiff Athletic, to add to Friday's 5-0 victory against Arminen, completed what was a comfortable pool campaign, with Loreto the strongest team, by some distance, in their half of a poor competition.
They should have beaten a mediocre Cardiff side missing all three of their "unavailable" first-choice midfielders by a greater margin yesterday, having led 3-0 after 28 minutes, but their concentration slipped and the Welsh took advantage by scoring late in each half.
Nikki Symmons finished off a fine move involving Cathy McKean and Sarah Scott after three minutes and scored her fourth goal in three games when she fired home from a short corner after 20 minutes. Orla Ryan made it 3-0, converting a smartly worked corner, but Sarah Waters pulled a goal back for Cardiff a minute before the break.
Nineteen-year-old Elaine Hickey, a member of the Dublin camogie team, capped a lively appearance as a substitute by scoring Loreto's fourth 12 minutes into the second half, tapping home from close range after good work by Ryan and Wendy Byrne.
Tracey Evans, though, capitalised on some loose defending in the 68th minute to score Cardiff's second of the game.
There was a similar pattern to Saturday's match, with Loreto all but sealing the points in the opening 12 minutes, when they scored twice, through Sarah Scott and Caitriona O'Kelly, the player of the tournament so far - but, again, they lost their way for a spell in the second half.
Louisa Healy saved a stroke on 55 minutes, one she conceded at the end of a period of concentrated Leopold pressure, before Rachel Brophy calmed nerves with a crisp strike from a corner three minutes later.
The Belgians finally found a way past Healy in the 62nd minute and if they'd concentrated their passions on the game rather than the umpires in the closing stages, they might have made the contest interesting.
Admittedly, the officials appeared to have invented their own rule book - in fact, one of the few umpires at this tournament apparently familiar with the official rules is the former Old Alexandra player Carol Metchette - but Leopold earned themselves three yellow cards, two of them overlapping, for incessant dissent, to reduce the team to nine players for the last four minutes.
Lorenzoni, meanwhile, beat a weak Cambrai team 4-2 yesterday to finish second in their pool, behind Dinamo Sumy.
Victory against the Italians today would not only secure Loreto gold on their European debut but also ensure promotion for Ireland to next season's A division - and having retained the Irish Senior Cup this season Loreto would directly benefit from that promotion, unless they win the Irish Club finals, in which case Cork Harlequins would take their place in the 2004 Cup Winners' Cup.
LORETO (v Cardiff): L Healy, A O'Brien, S Rand, C Grealy, O Ryan, S O'Meara, C O'Kelly, N Lyons (capt), N Symmons, C McKean, S Scott. Subs (all used): M Harkin, W Byrne, E Hickey, S Cooney, R Brophy.
