Lacrosse: Rochdale looks forward to summer of success

Rochdale Lacrosse Club is gearing up for what could be a stellar summer.

The Rochdale side has four members in the men’s U19 England and Wales teams in this summer’s World Championships taking place in Limerick, Ireland, in July.

Tom Teal, Alex Halliday and Daniel Madeley will join the final 33-man squad training for the England side, whilst Josh Croney will play for Wales.

The former three players were part of the victorious England U20 Mens side in the first-ever European Lacrosse Championship last year.

 

 

The England side including the Rochdale players beat an older, more experienced German side 9-8 in the final to win and become the first U20 European Champions.

• www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/4/sport-news/128952/lacrosse-england-named-champions-of-inaugural-lax-u20s-european-championships

The Men’s Under-19 World Championships commenced in 1988 with Australia, the USA, Japan and Canada playing host. The championship tournament runs every four years, and has been won by the USA each time so far.

The final England squad will be 23 players plus two travelling reserves and all three men have an excellent chance of making the final squad. The squad will also be travelling to Prague over Easter to play in an invitational event with the Czech Republic, Germany and Latvia.

The club will be looking to run fundraising events to raise funds to support the England U19s World Cup campaign. The estimated cost of participating is around £3,400 per player and players are required to fund themselves as they receive no financial support from the governing body.

Closer to home, Rochdale is also preparing to host North of England Flags finals on behalf of the North West Lacrosse Association in April, 11 finals of top-level junior and senior lacrosse over two days.

Additionally, the Rochdale club has a number of boys on the England Talent Pathway programme: Ed Pickard, Josh Clegg, Ethan Brierley, Troy Swanick, Harry Teal and Spencer Watson.

The Rochdale U12s and U16s teams are merged with Brooklands in Sale, a partnership that has existed for a couple of years and is working well and keeping boys in the game, whilst the U14s have just enough players to field a team and are holding their own against some good teams.

Rochdale Lacrosse Club’s ladies side continues to grow since being established three years ago. The side has 16 girls on roll from ages eight to 15 and field an U13s team, merged with Norbury U15s.

Georgia Brown, Ella Gudgeon and Charlotte Tilley are all in the Lancashire U15s B team, whilst one member of the Rochdale U15s ladies also plays for Stockport at U18s and open age.

 

 

Charlotte Madeley is part of the Lancashire U15s A and U18s A teams as well as the North East U18s A side. Charlotte also received an invite, without a trial, to join the U19s National Academy.

Lacrosse has a rich and extensive history in Rochdale, having been played since 1888. Rochdale Lacrosse Club is one of the five eldest clubs in the UK.

Modern day lacrosse descends from and resembles games played by various indigenous American communities, originally devised as a war game to stop killing among the tribes of the Iroquois Indian Nations.

In 1876, Queen Victoria witnessed an exhibition game and was impressed, saying ‘The game is very pretty to watch’. Her endorsement was enough for many English girls' schools to adopt the sport in the 1890s.

By the 20th century, many high schools, colleges and universities had adopted lacrosse as a league sport. Lacrosse became an Olympic sport for the 1904 and 1908 summer Olympics but was then dropped as an official sport.

After 1908, lacrosse was a sport in the World Games.

The U19 World Championships and Lacrosse festival takes place in Limerick between 9-18 July 2020.