Best buds make top squad

BY ALAN APTED

Playpen buddies Thomas Heather and Salmaan Sills are close to being a first in New Zealand sport.

The 13-year-olds have gone from babies crawling the floors of the Heather home in Manurewa to playing for the same New Zealand sports team.

The best friends are in the New Zealand under-14 in-line hockey team to play Australia in a test series in April.

Needless to say each is stoked the other got in.

Not that it would have diminished their friendship had one not made it. But wearing the Silver Fern together has deepened a friendship that began when the two were babies.

It began when Lesley and Thomas Heather agreed to babysit neighbours Zarina and Peter Sills' three-year-old son Salmaan while they were at work.

Salmaan is just a few months older than Thomas. The pair went to kindergarten together and Randwick Park School and they'll attend Alfriston College when the school year starts next week.

They were inseparable until it came to sport.

Thomas was into karate while Salmaan, a Manurewa Marlins junior rugby league player and keen fisherman, was into athletics.

But Thomas hated karate and Salmaan hated athletics.

"Dad used to push me hard and I got tired of doing it," says Thomas who was an examination or two way from a black tip.

Salmaan is equally straightforward. "I was hopeless at athletics - I hated running."

It was in-line hockey that merged their sporting interest.

"Mum and dad got me into the car one day and told me they were taking me somewhere," says Thomas.

He was eight at the time.

"They refused to tell me where they were taking me. I asked and asked but they refused saying only that it was a surprise."

The car stopped in Roscommon Rd in Manurewa and young Thomas found himself outside a skating rink, the home of in-line skating team the Sabres.

"My eyes popped when I saw them playing. I loved it the first time I saw it," he says.

His love of skating goes back to a paper round his older sister Rawinia had when he was still in nappies.

Rawinia did her round on in-line skates and when younger brother turned four, mum and dad bought him a pair so he could keep his sister company and help her with the round.

So when Thomas found himself at a skating rink he was as happy as a kid in a chocolate factory. In fact he was smitten.

"I fell in love with the game and couldn't wait to try it out." he says.

It didn't matter that he knew nothing about in-line hockey.

He was a whizz on skates and that's what counted. The hockey would come later.

And he made rapid progress.

His skating ability and being athletic as well as left-handed gave his game an edge that he still enjoys.

He's now playing for the Mt Wellington Panthers and is one of the New Zealand team's leading players, as good on defence as he is on attack.

Salmaan - or Sid as the Heathers know him - was a late starter.

He only got into the game three years ago. He'd had enough of athletics when Thomas suggested he come along and have a shot at in-line hockey.

"I loved it because there's no running involved. Running's so boring."

Despite learning the game's fundamentals with a left-handed stick at first, the right-handed Salmaan made enough progress in those three years to make the New Zealand trials.

Thomas' mum Lesley believes the pair have made the New Zealand team because of their uncanny understanding of each other's play.

"Each knows exactly what the other is going to do and is always in position to assist," she says.

Salmaan was the first to get the letter telling him he'd been selected. He dashed across the road to make sure his best friend had too.

"I knew that if I was in the team Thomas was in the team," Sill says.

Why? "Because he's a better player than I am."

They are the only two south Auckland boys in the team.

Mrs Heather is as chuffed as the boys.

"Sid is a son to us and having both of them selected to play for New Zealand is just unbelievable."

- © Fairfax NZ News