Former Kookaburra and Illawarra hockey player Tristan White will make a one-off appearance for the NSW Pride men's team in their Hockey One League away clash with Canberra Chill on Saturday.
The inclusion was made after Illawarra players Flynn Ogilvie, Blake Govers and captain Jack Hayes were not named for the match-up in the nation's capital.
Govers had to have surgery for a cut on his head after a head clash with Ogilvie in the third quarter against Melbourne and didn't return for the fourth quarter. Pride captain Hayes and goalkeeper Nathan Ackroyd had other commitments for this weekend and in comes Wests Illawarra's Tom Miotto, who missed the last game.
"It's not a comeback, I'm just helping out while the team are short on troops," White said.
"There's a lot of the squad unavailable this round so I'm just filling in. Its for one game only."
White, a former premiership-winning University skipper, was also the first captain of the winning Pride team in their inaugural year in 2020, beating Brisbane in the Hockey One final.
He was also a gold medallist in hockey at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow and the 2017 Champions Trophy in Melbourne.
White is now only playing in Sydney and recently captained the Moorebank Liverpool team to another Sydney Hockey Premier League championship.
However, White will be fondly remembered when he had to withdraw from the 2016 Rio Olympics hockey team at the last minute due to an unexpected anterior cruciate ligament injury.
The Pride team will miss the trade mark drag flicks of Govers and Newcastle player Ky Willott against the Chill team who boasts the presence of former Indian Olympic drag flicker Rupinder Pal Singh.
The women's Pride team will see the return of Geringong's Hockeyroo Grace Stewart who missed the Melbourne game. Albion Park's Maddi Smith will captain the team against the Chill.
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