It'll be all or nothing for the Dalefield men's and women's hockey teams this weekend as they strive to eliminate any prospect of relegation from their Wellington premier division competitions. Both teams are involved in playoffs at the National Hockey Stadium in Wellington for fifth and sixth positions with the loserspossibly having to go through the agonies of a promotion-relegation match with the top division two side a month or so later. The word 'possibly' is used there because that will only happen if the division two teams in question have a desire to play in the premier league. Opposing the Dalefield men tomorrow are Harbour City-Tawa and while they beat Dalefield 6-3 as recently as last Sunday coach Mark Fenwick believes Dalefield are capable of turning the tables on this occasion. But he emphasised that would only happen if Dalefield played the composed, structured type of hockey necessary to thwart a side like Harbour City-Tawa who are very efficient at capitalising on other team's mistakes. "A lot of their goals come from breakaways so it's important we keep things tight," he said. "Accuracy is the key for us, if we get sloppy they'll take us out." Fenwick is convinced that given a fair share of possession Dalefield have enough scoring potential in their attack to produce a positive result. "We've been playing well lately without winning, it's about time the luck changed in that respect," he said. The Dalefield women front up to Hutt, the team they upset 3-1 at Clareville last weekend. Coach Rochelle Retter said that victory was built around a strong start which saw Dalefield up 3-0 at halftime and she wants more of the same tomorrow. "We were aggressive and rattled them and that's what we need to do again," she said. "They will be a bit short on confidence now and we have to create further doubts in their minds right from the word go."
