a desire, a dream, a vision, a passion.

Saturday, January 07, 2006

Hi guys,

I was plannin to hold a meeting to discuss a matter that has been troubling me for very long, but I thought that not many ppl would be interested to listen to my speech, coz it wuld be long and all. Therefore, i have decided to post it here anyway, hoping that all our team mates would read and think abt wat i'm gona say. This is gona be a long post yea, so i tell u'll 1st. So yea, if u are ready, lets begin

Guys, i have been thinking lately abt our team on how will we flair in the 'A' division. The thing is, we all want to be champions and all, but are we doing wat it takes to be on, are we training and playing like champions..... ask urself these qns. You'll want to be champions rite, so wat u gona do to be one. Listen carefully, its no point if one or two juz want to win the championship, its the whole team, its a team effort, each and everyone of us. So wat's ur choice, really. Mind you, its not easy to be champions, coz there is alot of time, commitment and sacrifices to be made. Its also no point at all, if u'll agree tat u'll want to be champions and juz train as per normal, NO, its not enuff. Really.... U see, other JCs, most of their players have alr been playing in secondary schs, and they have the experience and all, and their basics are there. But, WE, we are a special team, we start frm scratch, and learn from the very beginning of how to play hockey. Thus, do you see that we have to train many times more than them, if order to match their skills and all.... Can u see the link? So think abt it.

Let me share wif u my experience... when i was in Primary 6, i joined hockey and became the captain of the team, and my aim was to become champions... In fact, the whole team wanted to become champions, but we all knew it was gona be very difficult, coz there are other schs like St Andrews pri, Xishan pri, Si Ling pri, and other schs that are the powerhouse... in those schs, ppl start playing frm pri 3-4 onwards, and here we are juz joining hockey, and learning how to play. And wat more, our sch has juz started hockey, and we are the 1st badge to be in the CCA in our sch. And it was everyone dream to get the championship, so my teammates decided that we shuld work very hard to achieve the championship. So wat did we do? We made sacrifices, all of us, after sch, straight ran to the basketball court and started training.. Our basketball court is worse than MI basketball court, the ground was very very rough, and we nvr had a chance to train at the hockey pitch. Everytime we train on our fitness, basics and all, we have nvr seen the hockey pitch before... have nvr even had the chance to step on the hockey pitch before, until on the day of our tournament. So we also were crazy enuff to play hockey on our school field, that was very big, something like the size of a soccer field. We train every single day, except for saturday and sunday, those were our rest days. Mind you, the trainings we all did were tough, we did many long runs, punishments doing push-ups and all.... but we all had fun coz we all knew that we would be able to win the championship but it was really physically tiring, wat more, there were ppl in my team who were the oversize, and they suffered alot, but they nvr gave up, we motivated each other. These trainings happen for abt 4 months, everyday we trained and all.

Come to the tournament, we were all very excitied, as tat was the first time we saw the hockey pitch, and we were all sooo happy to see the sprinklers, the goal post, the D and all, coz we have nvr seen one before. We played hard and nvr gave up... We became the District Champions, and all of us were very proud of ourselves, our trainings, hard work, time, commitment, and effort all were well rewarded with the championship.... But it didnt end there... coz we were then selected to play for the National championship... In fact, we were all shocked, coz we thought it was all over alr, didnt noe got another tournament. One match i cannot forgot was when we vs Si Ling, they were all big size and were all very skillfull, its like every year, its either xishan pri or si ling to win the championship, its like a compulsory thing for them to meet in the finals. But we nvr gave up, the whole time, they were attacking, we were all very tired too, but we gave our best, although we were panting like dogs, we kept on tiring... The whole game my goalkeeper and defenders were kept busy, even our skrikers came to the D and defend, all 11 were in the D defending... Our goalkeeper really played very well, he made plenty of saves, he was also scared until he urined in his ball guard.... that was how scared he was coz he did not want them to score, and we all, played very hard, and supported each other.. Then one counter attack we had, and in fact, the only attack we had in the game, we manage to score the goal, that was the happiest moment in our team. We won the game and went to the semi's, there we vs xishan pri, and they were really good, and we were no match to them, as they were all like national players. We played hard, but we lost 4-0, but we knew we did our best, so tat was wat we wanted, and the whole stadium cheered for us and respected us, as we kept on fighting. Even the opponent supporters, coach, players all praised us. We got 4th in the tournament after losing to Mayflower in the 3rd and 4th placing round... we lost by penalities... but we were all happy tat we came this far... as we nvr expected to do so, as it was our 1st time too.

The reason for sharing wif u'll my story is because, i want u'll to see and noe how much it takes and means to my pri sch team to win the championship. They were really hungry to do better aft each training, and u can say they were all mad abt training, but one thing, they all made the sacrifices, time, commitment and effort to win the tournament... So nw, its up to u, do u want to be like them, do u want to be champions, do u want to train and become champions, its all in ur hands guys... the more input u put in, the larger output u get, so wat do u want? And mind u, its not easy, i totally agree, but it can be done... its juz tat are u'll willing to make the sacrifices, u'll can say, "ayiah, still early la, no need to train until like tat la" or " i got A levels this yr, got other commitments outside, got lots of homework, got to meet my gf, got tis got tat". Guys, if u'll want to be champions, u'll muz start early, and i dun deny we all got our own personal life, got this and tat, but its all how much u want to win the championship da... So its up to u, i have said enuff... I want to noe ur responese and choices, and comments... I duno how many ppl are readying this post, but i really hope all of our teammates are reading this.... See u'll in sch on monday, tkcr!

Regards
Gopal

MI Hockey Team 12:40 PM
// the PASSION