Ellerstina Etiqueta Negra edged La Dolfina Jaeger LeCoultre 15-12 to obtain the 114th dition of the Hurlingham Open, yesterday at the Hurlingham Club.
With their triumph, as happened in 2005, the Champions have chances to win the Triple Crown as they also took the Tortugas Open. The watch resulted as rare as the weather, as it started with a sunny sky, then became cloudy and finished rainy and windy. The actions were also different from one chukker to the other, basically as a result of the changes in the losers` line-up.
In fact, thanks to 2 goals scored by Adolfo Cambiaso, La Dolfina took a 2-0 lead in the first period, but the winners reacted in the second period scoring 4 goals and demonstrating they should be very difficult to beat. Things changed with two minutes to go from the third period, when Cambiaso left the field having an injured muscle in one of his legs, beeing replaced by Brazilian Rodrigo Ribeiro de Andrade. When this happened, Ellerstina was leading 7-4 and it seemed that La Dolfina would not be able to came from
behind.
Far from this, last Argentine Open champions improved their task, with Mariano Aguerre dominating the midfield, building good plays and starting deep attacks for his team. Thus Ellerstina lost their concentration and, during the next three chukkers, they played below form, losing them 3-5 to be 10-9 ahead.
With his team just one goal behind, Cambiaso unexpectedly returned in the start of the seventh period. With his presence on the field, everybody expected a losers reaction and so the actions became exciting, with the spectators celebrating every play built by the best player in the world.
On the contrary, it was Ellerstina which played brillantly the last two periods, with Facundo Pieres as a first forward scoring 5 goals -two of them in a superb way- to give his squad a deserved victory. Asked Gonzalo Pieres jr. why they had played better
with Cambiaso on the field, he answered: “we had a plan to stop Adolfito, but when he left the game we were leading by three goals and saw our rivals playing
with two substitutes ( Magrini had replaced Monteverde from the start), we committed a big error as we thought we had won the match. Fortunately we could
change our minds immediately. Now we are trusted in winning the Triple Crown.”
Close to him, Matìas Mac Donough, one of the figures of the final who will retire from Ellerstina by the end of the present season, being replaced by Juan
Martìn Nero, said the field was very poor, but “in spite of that we could overcome La Dolfina which is nowadays one of the best teams in the word.”
TEAMS, goals in brackets and chukker scores:
Ellerstina Etiqueta Negra (15):
Pablo Mac Donough 9 (1)
Gonzalo Pieres jr. 10 (1)
Facundo Pieres 10 (10-3 pen)
Matìas Mac Donough 9 (3).-38
La Dolfina Jaeger Lecoultre (12):
Adolfo Cambiaso 10 (3-2 corners) (replaced by Rodrigo Ribeiro de Andrade
7 (1) from the 5 minutes of the third period to the
end of the sixth)
Matìas Magrini 8 (2)
Mariano Aguerre 10 (5-2 pen, 1 corner)
Bartolomé Castagnola 10 (1).-38
Chukker scores:
Ellerstina 0-2, 4-4, 7-4, 7-6,9-7,10-9,13-10,15-12.
Referees: Daniel Boudou and Matìas Baibene
Judge: Juan Jose Diaz Alberdi