Hockey

Hockey equipment isn't cheap (skates, elbow pads, gloves, helmHockey is one of our favourite sports. Here in Portugal people don’t know much about it or they don’t care because financially speaking it is a sport that requires a great financial investment. ets, masks, sticks, shoulder pads, shin guards ... ) and you also need to practise in a skating rink. This drives away young fans who can play most other sports anywhere. But hockey is really an interesting game. It’s a sport full of action that combines the pleasure of skating with amazing dribbles and hits. It’s a sport of hard work and endurance.
Our hockey story is very rich in events and victories and we have great players like Paulo Alves, Carlos Resende, Victor Fortunato, and Filipe Gaidão. But the best player of all, in our opinion, is Panchito Velasquez. You just have to see how he controls the ball.
The best teams in Portugal are Óquei de Barcelos, Paço D’Arcos, FC Porto and Benfica although this last one is badly ranked in the Portuguese league this year.
Most of us never played hockey, the closest we got to was to a pair of skates. And only Henrique gets to skate these days.
<B>Henrique:</B> <I>“I learnt how to skate very early and when I was 13 years old my father took me to my first live game. Since then I became a fan. Nowadays I don’t skate that often because school is very demanding but whenever I can I skate until my legs burn and my backs ache. Skating gives me a feeling of flying without leaving the ground.”</I>
We all wish there would be more people supporting hockey.


Article written by: Henrique Silva, Jacinto Marques, Ricardo Caldeira, Rui Moura, Miguel Santos, João Rodrigues, André Guerreiro and Tiago Aldeias.