Falklands Islands Hockey Prepare For LATAM Amerigol Cup

 

 

UK Government | August 27, 2022 –  The Falkland Islands ice hockey team – the Stanley Penguins – will be in the Miami area from the 10th-18th of September for the LATAM Amerigol Cup, taking place at the Florida Panthers IceDen (3299 Sportsplex Dr, Coral Springs, FL 33065).

 

 

They are off!
Good luck to our Falklands teams as they head off to ice hockey tournaments in Punta Arenas next week and then Miami next month. © Facebook

 

 

The team has won competitions across the region, despite there being no ice rink on the Falkland Islands themselves – the team practice on inline skates in the Falklands and leave early to practice on ice. Ahead of the competition in Miami they will leave the islands early to practice on ice in Punta Arenas in southern Chile: for many of them it will be the first time in four years they have played on ice. As the Falkland Islands are a self-governing British overseas territory, the British Consulate in Miami will be supporting the team locally. This will not be the first time the Penguins participate in the tournament, which hosts countries from across Latin America and the Caribbean (i.e Chile, Colombia).

 

The Stanley Penguins will be representing their country – a self-governing British Overseas Territory that is home to over 3,200 people from 60 nationalities. The community has built a thriving, modern and diverse island democracy in the forty years since their Liberation in 1982 after the Argentine invasion: the New Yorker article here gives a good idea of the changes.

 

The people of the Falkland Islands were asked in 2013 whether they wished to retain their constitutional links to the UK – in a referendum, which had international observers, 99.8% of the voters chose to retain the Islands’ status as a self-governing Overseas Territory. Despite their clear wish, Argentina continues to pursue its sovereignty claim, denying the Islanders have the right to decide their own future.

You can follow the team on Twitter @HockeyIslands
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