~JcZw

Handball FMS today. It was a much bigger thing than last year's, with each level sending a team.

It was also a terribly hot day. I could feel it when I walked down to SRC from KE, already warming my legs below my tracks.

Our team consisted of a wide variety of players, from the towering Bingyi, to the stocky Keith and the lean mean Ben Ding whom I must say saved our necks more than a few times. We had a good mix of players alright. It was pretty interesting, actually, how we could see how each team had its own style of playing.

M1s: The Young Upstarts. Full of energy, dashing here and there, bouncing off the defenders and off the floor. All spectacular moves and to be sure the Team To Beat. But they started out slowly, hadn't gelled and with our team still being fresh, our defences were strong, almost airtight. Ben duly delievered on the other side, with Keith and Xizhen adding their contributions. M2 5 - M1 2

M3s: The Long Distance Shooters. The M3s didn't penetrate our defence a single time. Not once did they reach the 6 m line. But shooters like HanJie with screaming, swerving balls fired THROUGH the defenders played merry hell with the short M2 goalkeeper (guess who). We finished the second half tied at 3-3 (Ben had applied his own hat trick at the other side of the field on HuiJin, my senior also from KE) and went into sudden death.

It was at this crucial juncture where I made the most vital save in my entire life, though it wasn't the glamest. The M3s did a wave and had a free man on the right flank. If he had taken two steps to the front he wouldn't either have been at point blank range or he could also have been closed down, so predictably, he let fly from about 7 meters out. I was ill positioned to throw myself out of the goal and so ended up throwing myself ACROSS the goal instead,increasing the distance I had to cover.

The ball thumped into my left finger and my third finger took the shock o_0. Lucky the buddy support with the 4th finger worked fine and I JUST turned the shot around the post.

The deadlock was eventually broken when Ben broke and went one-on-one with HuiJin and converted. M2 4 - M3 3

3. M4s. Fast breakers. We were so close, but were denied by the only team who's profile I didn't know so well. The M4s, having just finished THEIR half hour break were in a much fitter state, whereas we had just finished gruelling match with our seniors. It was 11 am, and the sun was blazing hot.

And to make matters worst, they played fast breaks, which suited them far more than it did our battle-weary team. 4 times they broke, 4 times they converted, putting the game away at 4-2, Xizhen pulling back a good goal at the last minute which their keeper didn't even deign to save haha.

For the record, let me say that two crucial refereeing errors went against us. And while true, we were subject to the same referee, I couldn't help feeling that this was a game where fouls were given according to "feel" by the referee rather than cold knowledge of what fouls should be given what penalties.

While we had been plodding along with our tournament though, M1s had beaten M4s in their match. Which meant we had beat our juniors who had beat our seniors who had beat us. But the M1s had the superior goal difference which means they went to the finals, where they didn't disappoint and beat the M5s.

Was pretty irked by the manner of our loss since we were so close to going into the final. But realised while refereeing the latter that actually I was also pretty tired. In fact by the end of the match I just wanted to go somewhere and fall asleep heh. So I did, back in KE.

Well its been a momentous day. And thanks to my classmates, I had quite a lot of fun! We'll go to MUNUS next year and kick some people's backsides =) But for now, neuro anat, with its nucleuses, tracts and columns await.