This month we are marking the 60th anniversary of a hockey match! We are fortunate to have the match ball from the game between Cheltenham Grammar School and Pate’s Grammar School for Girls which took place in March 1961 at Albert Road. It was kindly donated by Marcus Giles, the top scorer from the match. 

Marcus recalls this match as being hard-fought; the boys winning on the day despite their ‘lack of skill’, through ‘brute-force and luck’ as well as benefiting from the fact that two of their players were extremely fit from playing rugby for England Schools. The final score was 2-1, with Pete Horton-Bone scoring for the girls (we think she was the England Schools girls’ hockey captain).

This was the second match of a two-match series which was won by CGS for the second year in succession. We don’t know why the matches started or why they stopped but we found no further mentions of matches between the girls and boys until 2005, when, at PGS, the boys 1st football team challenged the girls 1st hockey team to a hockey showdown – and won 1-0! Former student Lucy Ashman’s write up in Pate’s Progress at the time tells of Year 13 girls forming a supportive cheerleading squad on the touchline, the boys’ obvious speed, the girls’ skill and the serious half time team talks on both sides! 

Please post a comment if you played in either the 1961, 1962 or 2005 matches or if you know of any other matches that took place between the girls and boys. If you recognise yourself in the 2005 team photos let us know and if anyone has any photos from the matches in the 1960's we'd love to see them!