GREENWELL Point’s Barbara Muldoon has played a starring role in helping her Australian Women’s Masters Wattles 60s team finish fourth at the recent Masters World Cup.
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Held in Terrassa, Spain from July 27 to August 5, it was the second time Muldoon has represented her country, after deduting in 2014.
“Heading into the World Cup, my preparation was good – I had a personal trainer who helped me with my strength training,” Muldoon said.
“I also had a friend who helped me by doing some running drills at lunch time, as well as my normal hockey games and club training sessions.
“It was hard for the team to train together as we were from all over Australia, so the team preparation was done in Barcelona, before the tournament.”
Muldoon and the Wattles won three of their five pool games, to finish third.
The first game was against eventual winners England, who won 7-nil.
“The score was not indicative of the game, as this was our first real game together,” Muldoon said.
“In game two, against New Zealand, the coach changed things around a bit in this game which helped but we still lost 3-nil.
“We had our chances but couldn’t put the ball in the net.”
They got on the board in their third game, defeating the Netherlands 2-nil before being pitted against the other Australian side.
“We knew this would be hard but our coach had a game plan and we stuck to it, unlike our fellow countrymen,” she said.
“We produced our best game of the tournament and won 1-nil.”
The team’s final pool game was against the Alliance team, which the Aussies won 4-nil – setting up a bronze medal showdown with the other green and gold side.
“We knew this match would be tough,” Muldoon said.
“They scored early, we stuck to our game plan again and managed to score just before fulltime, seeing the game end 1-all and sending it to penalty shoot-out.”
The shoot-out went down to the wire too but unfortunately the other Aussie team ended up winning 2-1.
Despite losing in those circumstances, Muldoon is still proud of her performances in Spain.
“I felt my personal performance was really good – the coach at the end of the tournament gave an award to the best on field and off field player and I won that award, which was a total surprise,” she said.
“Our whole team was amazing – our performance was above what we could have hoped for, thanks largely to our coach and the team leaders.
“It’s always a spine tingling experience to wear the green and gold uniform and the coat of arms is on your chest.
“It’s an experience I won’t ever forget in my hockey career.
“I hope that I have another opportunity to represent my country again in the future.”