Sport
5 October, 2021
Atherton local up for Australian hockey squad
A young Atherton based hockey player has taken a massive leap forward in his representative career being named part of a special squad in contention for the 2022 Australian U15 Championships team.
Patrick Stevens from Atherton competed in the U15 State Championships held in Bundaberg in recent weeks and due to his performance over the championship, he was selected to go one step further.
Out of the hundreds of kids that played at the State Championships only a select few were named for the next squad, four of which were from the Cairns region, Patrick was the only one from the Tablelands.
His interest in hockey first shone through during school with a small inter-school competition and from there his passion and love for the game only grew.
Since then, Patrick has played a total of nine seasons of hockey, seven in Atherton and two in Cairns.
“I enjoy playing hockey because I can play with friends and develop social and mental skills,” he said.
“It feels pretty exciting to be named in the squad, it’s something that I’ve really strived to get to.
“For the first couple of hours I didn’t know what to say to people when they congratulated me.”
In February of next year Patrick will join some of the best hockey players in Queensland in contention for the Australian team.
