Varsity Boys’ Football vs Shrewsbury On Wednesday 28th of September the Varsity Boys’ Football team traveled to play rivals Shrewsbury in a league match away from home. The boys knew that this would be a tough challenge but nevertheless they needed to come out with a win from this match to be well-ranked for the upcoming BISAC tournament. The match started smoothly as the Varsity Boys’ applied early pressure towards the home side. With scruffy passing from the home side, the Varsity Boys’ were able to use their mistakes to create chances of our own with the likes of Lo Sidelind and Kevin Wuethrich creating the first few chances. However, they didn’t reach the back of the net. Hard work and pressure was quickly and consistently applied by striker Michael Nunbhakdi who looked dangerous to the opposing side. Not long into the half, the Varsity Boys’ went 1-0 up thanks to a swift shot from Alessandro Kho Pablo who caught the keeper off guard. Shrewsbury refused to give up and fought back strongly creating trouble for the Varsity Tigers. However, a well struck shot from distance by Shaan Ali hit the back of the net making it 2-0 to the Tigers. Not long before the end of the first half Shrewsbury broke the deadlock to come back 2-1. The second half started slow for the Varsity Tigers as a quick goal from the Shrewsbury side leveled the score to 2-2. But the inspirational half-time talk from Mr Osborne and Coach Manibu was not forgotten as the team fought back harder than ever. With great defending by center backs Denis Sprenger, James Ashford and Ben Aryle nothing was getting the better of them. Hard work finally paid off when James Ashford made it 3-2 with 10 minutes to go! Another goal was then added by the Tigers as a superb half volley by Shaan Ali was struck hard into the bottom left corner. The coaches were highly impressed and classed this as one of the best goals so far in the season. The final whistle blew and the score ended 4-2. Now the Varsity Boys’ sit with 6 points on top spot in the table. Next game is a hard home game against TRAIL which will be the deciding match for 1st and 2nd seed for BISAC. Final score: Shrewsbury 2-4 BPS Goal scorers: Alessandro Kho Pablo (1), James Ashford (1), Shaan Ali (2)
Under 15 Girls’ Touch vs ISB Last Monday, the team arrived with their correct kit and were ready to play! ISB have been our number one competition in Touch Rugby for many years, so some of our team members were understandably nervous and essentially not very optimistic. When the opposition arrived, we had done our warm up and drills, focusing on settles and defending drills. In the first half, we were put under pressure and our nerves got the better of us allowing ISB to draw level with us, 2-2. Our tries were scored by drawing out players and passing to the wings. Unfortunately, there were many gaps in our defence allowing ISB to run pass and score. ISB could have scored more if they hadn’t dropped so many balls. In the second half, we gained in confidence, trusting our teammates and listening and believing the encouraging words of coach and captain. We were able to close our gaps, increase our settles and were more focused! We finished with winning score of 5-2. I think what we improved upon the most was knowing when to substitute because we successfully tired out the opposition. Things to work on in our next match are settles, being vocal and maintaining focus.
Under 13 Girls’ Basketball vs ISB This was our fourth match and was against ISB. We were a little bit sleepy at the start and weren’t concentrating on defending. They were leading until the third quarter and when our coach reminded us to calm down and ignore our nervous, we went into game mode and everyone started to cheer each other on. We were trying to be more enthusiastic to re-energise the players on the court. Our team came back and was leading all of a sudden with free shots. We finished with a nice shot, giving us the point we need to take the game 17-16. On reflection it was another tense game. Next time we will work on looking up when we have the ball so then the open person can call for it and go for the shot. Other than that our team is getting better and better.