Soccer Fellowship Report [16th October]

In the buildup to PMC Cup 2010, soccer fellowship shifted to Sports Planet this week and next week for teams to condition themselves to the competitive venue. Its probably the change in venue to East Coast Park that saw much of the players turning up pretty late.

The initial arranged teams did not play as per listed in the email. A mixture of 8 players hit the pitch first before the rest of the players slowly trickle into Sports Planet. It wasnt long before the clear 3 teams can be seen, namely 'whites', 'reds' and 'other colour'.

The artificial pitch proved much challenge initially for everyone, as players tries to get used to the ground. Within the first 10 minutes, 2 soccer boots gave way, with Keemin subsequently withdrawing while Nigel chose to play with 1 boot on only.

Afew queries arises as not everyone were clear with rules thats will be inplace for the PMC cup. Questions such as the backline being 'out' or not, can players enter the 'semi-D', any corner kicks, can the goalkeeper come out of semi-D but not use hands etc. Just for this game, we played with the backline as 'out' with corner kicks, no players can enter the semi-D, and goalkeeper not to exit the semi-D. Time for everyone to go back and read the Rules!

With 3 teams rotating non-stop for about 1 and half-hour, everyone was really pushed to the limits physically as we tried to keep running, while rotating tired players to the post. Of the 3 teams, the Whites manage to stay on the pitch for quite along time, largely due to them always playing together in the past fellowship games and thus the understanding and bonding.

Overall it was a good runout for all 17 players who turned out. Definitely much work to be done, tactically and physically, if any of us are going to snatch the trophy away from last year's champion. At least thats what i thought, based on the little memories still in my mind of how last year's champion tormented my team!