Story contributed by reader Ernest Aw, captain of the Hwa Chong Institution C Division team. Pictures by Lai Jun Wei.
Basically it was hours of gruelling training after our loss to the Anglo-Chinese School(I). Most of us were devastated and were almost too depressed to carry on playing in the tournament. Our coach upon scrutinising the situation, fished this book entitled ‘True Success’ from his bag. Written by three time olympic boxer champion Mohammad Ali, it contained some inspirational quotes and phrases. One of the most impressionable ones to me was “True success isn’t all about winning, it’s about conquering that fear and hardship, then rising again as a true winner'”. This quote was like the spark that lit our ‘dying flame’. It could be classified as mental and psychological preperation otherwise. Apart from that, we were faced with “hell” as our coach wanted to impart some of his tactics to us after much meticulous planning. Although those drills and rigourous training overwhelmed us, we could observe much improvement in our game against ACS(Barker Road). We were reminded constantly not to be complacent.
After receiving news that Raffles had tied with us in terms of points, more strenuous activities and drills followed in a bid to mould our fitness into perfection. Personally I feel that during our game against ACS(I), my team wasn’t performing at it’s maximum potential, in fact we were under-peforming. As what I have seen in the various training sessions and friendly matches we have gone through, our performance that day was far from desired. After the short recovery period was the match against Raffles, which decided who would enter the finals.
Monday, March 17, ACS(I) Swimming Pool – We had actually arrived a little late and had little time to warm up. Though some of us were quite anxious, we still tried to maintain high morale so that we could ensure a smooth game. It was not long before the game started. Thankfully, it went off quite positively for us. The first quarter was quite assuring, Tai Joum and me scoring 3 goals between us for Hwa Chong.
But then came the second. We conceded a goal which made us quite disorientated. We tried our very best to refocus and raise our guard.
All was going quite well and by the third quarter, we were leading by quite a few goals. This seemingly made the Rafflesians agitated, resulting in them missing most of their shots. Even worse, they were making random shots from every corner just to try and squeeze in a goal. Fortunately, all of my team mates were on high alert that day, tackling most of the balls and stealing possesion from Raffles. Not to mention my keeper, who did extremely well in saving the many speed shots hurled at him by Raffles Institution.
By the last quarter, we started stalling for time since we didn’t want to lose this precious lead by conceding any more goals. The ball is round, and in competitions, anything is possible. We changed our strategy, glueing to all our opponents as instructed by the coach. It was also quite a good change as most of us were burnt out since we only had 8 secondary 2 players – just enough for a standard team. It was also quite risky to place the secondary 1s in because they lack prior experience to the game and this very match was extremely crucial to us.
Time passed quickly and we managed to seal all their movements, even scoring a goal in the last quarter.
Water Polo is not only about individual skill and talent. Teamwork also plays a great role. Without proper communication and synchronisation, I think it would have been impossible for us to even score a goal against anyone of our opponents. This game against Raffles is the key towards our championships. We have now been drawn closer towards what we’ve always been thinking of. Complacency is not an option. We would all have to strive harder if we want the championships. This win does not signify a time to celebrate, but another period of hard work.
Score:
HCI vs RI
1st quarter: 3-0
(Ernest Aw x2, Tan Tai Joum)
2nd quarter: 1-2
(Tan Tai Joum ; Lai Ming Kang, Clarence Woon)
3rd quarter: 1-0
(Tan Tai Joum)
4th quarter: 1-1
(Ernest Aw, Tan Tai Joum ; Daryl)
Final score: 6-3
Top scorers:
Ernest Aw (HCI #3) – 3 goals
Tan Tai Joum (HCI #8) – 3 goals
Hwa Chong Institution:
#1 Xiong Xing Yu
#2 Ang An Jun
#3 Ernest Aw
#4 Edward Chow
#5 Bryan
#6 Leung An Li
#7 Jarrrett Toh
#8 Tan Tai Joum
#9 Adriel Ng
#10 Chan Min Gao
#11 Reynold Tan
#12 Leung An Jian
#13 Nicholas
Raffles Institution:
#1 Abraham Tan
#2 Gerard Low
#3 Lai Ming Kang
#4 Edward Tan
#5 Tay Zhi Yuan
#6 Neo Seh Woon
#7 Clarence Woon
#8 Marcus
#9 Fabian
#10 Daryl
#11 Lesmana Christopher
#12 Brandon Tan
#13 Natamiel
Ed’s note: If you recognise yourself or your teammates in any of the photos, do leave your names behind in the comments section and we will update accordingly. Thanks!
More pictures in the gallery.
way to go spell my name wrong ooh my hand looks so screwed wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.
My name is Adriel from Hwa Chong Water polo team. Ermm….. my name is spelled wrongly.
The final picture captioned a mad dash for the ball……the RI player is Clarence Woon.