Sunday, October 21, 2007

Still A Long Way To Go

Consistency is the key word. Sporadic at the most, Mr. Jason this week implored that the players keep their momentum.

"As any athlete knows, momentum is the most unstoppable force in sports. The only way to stop it is if you get in your own way, start making stupid mistakes or stop believing in yourself." Not exactly what he said (we people love to glamorize things), but surely what he meant.

Though expecting little, attendance surprised everyone this week with thirteen people coming for training including Christopher and Mervin from Minden Underdawgs.

After gaining some enlightening insight from the sports leadership camp he attended last week, Mr. Jason made sure to apply what he learned in training right from warm-up.

Snakes. Passes. Shots. Only one hour for drills, as Mr. Jason promised. Match time!

...Or not. He apparently has a different understanding of a 'drill' and a 'game'. Dividing the players into groups of two, the court was divided into three, and, in their teams, the players were supposed to play a 2v2 match, the goal being a miserable cone.

"This is to develop the Brazilian style of play... samba!"

Didn't happen. Which means that this drill should become more or less a permanent fixture in training until the players are able to play pretty. Ugh.

Making it three a team, he intoduced another brainwave. Two matches were to be played on the same court, diagonally, which meant collisions. Lots of collisions. Very interesting; very messy.

Then finally, finally, for the last half-hour, came match time. For the first time since August, it was a basic 5-on-5, suddenly making the court look very small. The two teams mostly cancelled each other out, though Mervin's stunner from half-court that caught Lin Ken out (!) was absolutely magic.

Nothing really extraordinary about training this week, but then again:

"Perfection consists not in doing extraordinary things, but in doing ordinary things extraordinary well."

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I've always believe in the indian hockey philosophy,

Skills = Technique + Pressure

Pressure is defined as limitation in time and space.

5 on 5 has always been in my mind since I took over. But at that point, i felt that our players weren't ready for it. Development of basics was my main focus at that time. I took this advice from the Subang team manager, Mr.Suresh.

Now that they've graduated from kindergarden to primary school, the syllabus have to be upgraded.

The players did well this week. Impressive. There were a few nice and beautiful passes and plays. But
we still have a long way to go.

I want to say thanks to the President of PFA Mr.James Looi and PFA coach, Mr.Edward Lim for enlightening me to go ahead with the 5 on 5.

May the upgraded syllabus spur us to the next level of play :)

Anonymous said...

Err...India is rather lousy in playing floorball you know; though they may be good in hockey!Ask LinKen about last year's APAC!Anyways,keep up the great work you guys are doing for the game!