Last week, our England Under 14s team travelled to Belgium to participate in their first-ever Four Nations event, competing against strong national teams from Scotland, Norway and the host nation. 

On Thursday the team arrived in Mechelen, and after some lunch, they had their skates on for their first training session of the weekend, led by England U15s head coach Jon Kynaston, supported by Mikey Gilbert and Sean Martin.

After being put through their paces, and fuelled up, the team got chance to relax in the evening, awaiting the weekend games and activities to begin.

On Friday morning, they had a pre-game skate with hosts Belgium, in a shared session where coaches worked together to mix players in different stations, and have players train and compete on exercises in the morning.

After lunch, they was then refreshed and ready to hit the ice again for the commencement of the Four Nations series.

Up first were Belgium, which was a close affair. However, a goal in the third period helped England to a 1-0 victory.

After a good night’s sleep, England were back on Saturday morning, this time to have a shared session with their Norwegian counterparts. Once again, it was a fantastic experience mixing the two teams and giving them experience with different coaches.

That afternoon, England played an exciting game, which went back and forth with goals, as some great movement from both teams and some superb skills on show, had the game going to overtime after being tied at 4-4 in regulation.

Once it got to overtime, England’s dominance then shone through when a two-on-one breakaway led to a sweet finish through the five-hole of the Norwegian netminder.

Onto the final day, and this time it was an early start again for our England team.

The squad turned up for the final game of the series against Scotland, which looked to be going quite one-sided as England, who looked refreshed, raced into a 3-0 lead.

However, some penalties from both sides led to some great chances being created by Scotland, who pulled it back to 3-2.

With the Scots piling on the pressure, even with a six-on-three in the final two minutes, they couldn’t get the equaliser, and England finished the series undefeated with three wins from three.

Overall, the biggest reward from this event was three very competitive games against tough, challenging teams.

All players participating were given their first experience of playing games against national teams outside of the Great Britain experience and were a credit to their parents and clubs for their attitudes and behaviour, both on and off the ice.

With GB Futures participating in Estonia, and England in Belgium, these opportunities and experiences will only benefit our young players.

And with more nations requesting to be invited/hosting future events, the national teams could be having some great opportunities more often.

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