Sunderland’s Oxclose Community Academy scored a double win in Thursday’s North East regional Handball Schools Games finals at South Shields’ Temple Park Leisure Centre.
Featuring schools from Tyne & Wear, Northumberland, Durham and the Tees Valley, the North East Schools Games is now in its third year, and is organised by the England Handball Association in partnership with Newcastle Vikings Handball Club.
Oxclose dominated the Under-15 girls competition with an opening 18-1 thrashing of the relatively inexperienced Ponteland Middle School, before beating Hartlepool’s High Tunstall College of Science 1-7. The Northumberland representatives also suffered a heavy 1-13 loss to the Teessiders.
The Wearsiders’ Under-13 boys also won both of their matches, 7-3 over High Tunstall and 0-14 against The Durham Federation school, with the Hartlepool school also keeping a clean sheet in beating Durham 11-0.
High Tunstall nevertheless took the Under-13 girls competition honours with two victories in beating Whitley Bay’s Wellfield Midde School 2-8 and the Durham Federation 8-2, while Wellfield narrowly beat Durham 3-4.
Wallsend’s Churchill Community College won a close battle for the boys Under-15 title as the North Tynesiders followed a 2-2 draw with a 2-4 win over High Tunstall.
The winning school age-group teams now have the opportunity to represent the North East region at the England Handball Association’s National Schools Games finals next month. Good luck to them all!
Newcastle Vikings Handball Club would like to congratulate all the victorious winners and thank all the schools for attending, as well as Tyne & Wear Sport and students from TyneMet College’s North East Sports Academy for helping run the tournament.