Ultra Milk Cup, Jakarta, Report
04 Nov 2008
We arrived in Jakarta with no Major events to report. Once our bus driver showed up to collect us he proceeded to entertain us by claiming he had no idea where Hotel Kristal was, if only we knew how true that was! He very kindly gave us a tour of all the city sights, mainly traffic. After a couple hours of not going very far he decided he'd better hire a taxi driver to actually get us to the hotel! We got in the general idea when Corine and Wendy piped up, demanding the driver to turn left. After a bit of sweating and a lot of self doubting Corine and Wendy put their heads together and eventually got us to the hotel! Well done ladies!
After a good and unexpected roast beef and yorkshire pud dinner, we put the kids to bed and prepared ourselves for the next morning.
We proceeded to the tournament venue where we were entertained by some young dancers (much to Sarin's interest) and some football jugglers. Eventually we got underway.
My under 12's started off with an unfortunate loss to a team we controlled throughout but a superb Charlie Lawrence own goal gave the opposition the win. We went into the next game determined to get our first win. Again we dominated and played some good football, winning 1-0, a scoreline that was set to be the theme of the day. We played extremely well for the rest of the day winning the next 5 matches to finish the day with 1 loss and 6 wins, comfortably top of the table.
The under 10's had a rollercoaster of a day. Every time i saw Coach Adam he had a different expression on his face! After battling through the day they finished with a record of 3 wins, 3 draws and 1 loss. Enough to qualify them for the cup competition the next day.
After a quick swim in the hotel pool we fed the kids and sent them off to bed.
On Sunday morning eveyone was pretty tired, but excited about having both teams in the cup competition. We learnt that the cup competition would consist of a 4 team group stage acting as the quarter finals. We would need to finish in the top two teams to continue on to the semi-finals.
Under 12's started off with a good win to calm the nerves and confidence was high. The under 10's also started well, looking so fierce in the warm-up their opposition decided not to show!!
In the Under 12's second game we had to play the hosts ASA, a team we had beaten 1-0 the previous day. ASA were out for revenge and unfotunetely our boys tired and never got going in this game. A couple of good goals were enough for them to claim the victory, despite an absolute screamer of a free-kick from Mitch Schofield.
The under 10's then lost their next game, leaving them in the same position as the under 12's. Both our sides needed to win their last game. The under 12's came up against a team they could and maybe should have beaten but on the day we never started to play our football. We lost and were knocked out of the competition. A big dissapointment as we all felt the boys had a good chance after their superb performances on the Saturday.
The Under 10's then suffered a big blow. They lost their influential captain Ryan Brouwer to food poisoning. However, a valiant team spirit won over and they were able to snatch the victory that put them into the semi-finals. Unfortunetely the semi-final match was a tough game which we ended up losing.
Overall, this was a fantastic weekend away and i was very proud of the boys perfomances, and in general their behaviour. I look forward to returning to this tournament next year and this time bringing home some silverware.
Oh and by the way we won the Under 12's Fairplay trophy! Remarkable as we were the only team i saw to have a man booked!!
