A REGIONAL hockey club will feature as part of an endurance challenge aiming to raise money for injured service personnel from the armed forces.

Gwent Hockey Club have teamed up with the Hockey for Heroes (H4H) team for the 2017 event, which has been codenamed - #OpStretcher.

The H4H team will be walking 200 miles in 10 days across Wales and England, while playing 30 games of hockey and carrying injured ex-serviceman on a stretcher- Dominic Robert Lovett.

Cwmbran Stadium will host two of the matches on Friday, May 26, following the first leg of fundraising marathon from Cardiff’s Sophia Gardens to Cwmbran.

Tim Miller, the chairman of Gwent Hockey Club, said the club and its members were proud to be supporting the challenger.

“Everyone at Gwent Hockey Club is extremely proud to be supporting the #OpStretcher challenge,” he said, “the response from the local community has been outstanding.

“Local members of the Royal British Legion, the Royal Welsh Regimental Association and the Veterans’ Association have volunteered to march alongside the Hockey for Heroes squad as they approach Cwmbran Stadium.

“We have an action packed evening of hockey planned and we would like to invite the public to come along to watch the high octane games and help raise funds for this worthwhile cause.”

The 44 members of the H4H team will carry Mr Lovett, a former British Marine who was injured during military training, from Wales to London with the trek ending on Sunday, June 4 at Marlow.

‘’We are about to embark on this 10 day objective, we feel prepared and ready to take this challenge head on,” said H4H CEO Joel Forrester.

“The planning and preparation has gone fantastically well and the squad are ready to make #OpStretcher a huge success.”

The H4H team are set to arrive between 6pm and 6.30pm on May 26, and will play two games against the Welsh Masters and the Gwent Hockey Club at 7pm and 8.30pm respectively.

A previous event in 2015 saw the H4H squad raised over £30,000 for the H4H charity by playing 33 hockey games across three countries while climbing the three highest peaks in the British Isles: Scafell Pike, Snowdon and Ben Nevis.

Visit justgiving.com/fundraising/OpStretcher.