Welcome to the 2022/23 season

We would like to welcome all our members, old and new, sponsors and supporters to the new 2022/23 season here at Three Rock Rovers Hockey Club! We look forward to seeing everyone back at Grange Road over the coming weeks and months as we see the return of our Ladies Firsts to the top table, the Men’s firsts in the EYHL and our Junior section continues to compete across the board at the highest level in Leinster and Ireland!

We must congratulate all our Rovers, current and aborad, who have represented themselves, the club, Leinster and Ireland over the summer.

Whether that was with the Irish Masters, Leinster U16, U18 or U21 or Ireland U16, U18 or U21, here in Ireland, England, or Holland each and every plyer has represented with aplomb! A particular shout out to Peter Blakeney who was a part of the Irish O35s side that claimed Bronze at the Masters World Cup!

Congratulations to all, after such a prolific summer of representing with Ireland at all age grades we were delighted to see that 34 members from our Juniors have been selected for Leinster ahead of the 2022/23 season! You can see the full list here: Leinster Age Grade Squads.

Within that selection we are delighted to see for the first time, in a few seasons, the inclusion of multiple Girls across all grades! A massive congratulations to all the girls on their hardwork to date and the support provided by their families, friends and coaches over the years!

We look forward to welcoming everyone to Grange Road, the home of Leinster Hockey, Three Rock hockey, hockey for all and all ages!

Bar Survey

At the end of last season a survey was sent to senior club members regarding the use of the bar and how best to manage this in the year ahead. We had 75 responses to this survey (58 men, 17 women, 2 non-playing members). Last season, 69% of those who responded had used the bar, and of those who didnt it not being open was listed as the main reason for it not being used (53.6%).

Overwhelmingly, 98.7% of respondents said that they wanted the bar to remain open. However, close to 3/4 of respondents are aware that the bar is not profitable without the support of volunteers in the club and 90% are in support of using volunteers in order to keep it open if the alternative was that the bar would have to close.

Based on these responses the committee and council will plan for the year ahead on the basis that the bar is to remain open with volunteer support from members required to ensure that this happens. A number of options are proposed for this with a focus on the following:
1) usual weekend activities
2) external events

1) Usual weekend activities
Last year we trialled the option of bar captains where each team had an bar captains responsible for requesting the bar be opened for teams. To allow appropriate time to manage opening procedures, order stock, set up and clean the clubhouse, bar captains had to contact the club manager to arrange procedures.

Half of respondents felt this was a good system to try again for the year ahead with another 38% feeling that a weekly rota per team may be the best option.

Given that there was a lack of awareness of the bar captain system we have decided to run it again for the year ahead, but are promoting it immediately as the main method of opening the bar. We would also like to run monthly events with teams assigned to a month in order to run the bar and increase the regular hours.

To ensure its success, we will be offering bar training for team members to help with this. Training will be run during our first social event of the season on September 10th with more details to follow.

2) External events
External events such as Cup Finals and Vets Fest are how the bar remains operational. Given the positive response regarding volunteering for these events in order to keep the bar open, we will be trailing a system this year where each senior team is assigned an event to cover and manage. These slots will be supported by the club manager to help those behind the bar.

We will outline this rota to team captains during the season and look forward to the first season in three years where we hopefully be able to operate the bar with more regular hours and events!

Official Balcony opening

Thanks to the hard work of many people over the past couple of years we are now in a position to say that the clubouse balcony has been repalced over the summer and will be open for the 2022/23 season!

You’ll have heard we’re having an official opening ceremony of the new balcony on the evening of Saturday 10th of September 2022!

The day will consist of selection matches, opening balcony ceremony along with a BBQ, the club house will also be open for the evening.

We would like to ask you to fill out this form if attending. We are very excited to celebrate the official opening of the new balcony and hope to see everyone there!https://docs.google.com/…/1FAIpQLScITHDNrgXG88…/viewform