Aussie double at Super 9s hockey
Australia took a clean sweep of men's and women's gold medals for the third consecutive year in the International Super Series Hockey 9s at the Perth Hockey Stadium on Sunday.
Both victories came against Argentina.
Glenn Turner, Russell Ford and Liam de Young scored twice in the Kookaburras' 9-4 win, and Madonna Blyth, Georgie Parker and Casey Eastham found the back of the net for the Hockeyroos in their 3-0 victory.
The Argentina men's team couldn't reproduce the heroics of a round-robin clash when it fought back from 4-1 down to draw 4-4 with the Kookaburras.
Five-times world player of the year Jamie Dwyer scored first for the Kookaburras after coming off the bench, finding a way to curl the ball in after five minutes.
Dwyer said the Kookaburras had produced their best performance of the week in the gold- medal game.
"Scoring nine goals in front of a really good crowd was great," Dwyer said. "Argentina have a great fighting spirit and we knew they would be a real threat."
The Hockeyroos raced to an early lead before goalkeeper Rachel Lynch stepped up, denying several Argentine attempts in the second half.
Hockeyroos captain Blyth, who was named player of the tournament, fired in the first goal of the match and her fifth for the series after two minutes.
Parker slotted home the second goal after nine minutes. Eastham completed the job a minute from time in the 40-minute format.
Coach Adam Commens said it was an impressive effort by the Hockeyroos against the defending world champions.
"We can see from this performance today that we can match it with Argentina," Commens said.
"They're a really attacking side and very athletic and the bigger ground suits them.
"Today we showed we could match it with them athletically and also technically and tactic- ally."
Canada defeated Malaysia 3-1 in the women's bronze-medal match, while the Malaysians also claimed the men's bronze with a 2-1 win against Pakistan.
The Hockeyroos will finetune their preparation for the Oceania Cup in New Zealand at the end of the month with two Tests against Canada in Perth on Tuesday and Wednesday.
