By Lai Jun Wei
Presbyterian High (Black) defeated Fairfield Methodist Secondary 2-0 (25-12, 25-22) in the last match for both teams in Round 2 of the U-16 Girls Volleyball Championship recently. The result of this game caused Yuying Secondary to lose out on a place in the semi-finals.
Yuying needed Fairfield to beat Presbyterian High (Black) to go through. However, that likelihood disappeared when Fairfield Methodist fielded a team of reserves. Fairfield were already out of contention and the reserves got a chance to play.
The Yuying team were frustrated to see their semi-final place disappear, especially since Yuying had beaten Fairfield Methodist 2-1 and Presbyterian High (Black) 2-0 in previous encounters.
As Fairfield had lost three out of four of their Round 2 matches, their remaining match against Presbyterian High was inconsequential. The Fairfield Methodist coach therefore fielded his reserve players and retired some of his main players to the bench.
This gave Presbyterian High an easier task and they took advantage to win 2-0.
Despite the unhappiness in the Yuying camp, some readers in the Red Sports chat box felt that giving the reserves a chance to play made sense.
A reader by the name of Mel said: "As a coach, your players are down for every match but all they do is sit on the bench. How would you feel? Surely you’d want them to gain some exposure, isn’t it?"
However, another reader retorted: "(Fairfield) should know that if they did this, some other team will be out. So to put in reserves to let (the reserve players) have the feel, it’s like killing the other team’s opportunity to qualify.”
But Mel replied: "You’ve to think of your players and not other teams right? Deep down in your heart, some of your players, though not up to certain standards, have been training hard. They didn’t get a chance to play much in that particular tournament, so maybe the coach wants them to leech (sic) some experience from it?"
According to the players, their coach told them after the game his reason for fielding the reserve players was to give them exposure.
To (:
If its rude of me to ask people to shut their mouths up, and creating a bad impression of fairfield’s coach then go round spreading rumours, then it’s rude, too. Of you to assume things which aren’t right. Why can’t a coach field his reserves to play for the last game? It’s not wrong and why do people have to go round giving him a bad name? It’s really about sportsmanship. Even if it was really done on purpose, you can’t do anything about it right? If you’re someone with sportsmanship, then you’d nothing but just accept the fact that you’re out. If you’re someone with no sportsmanship then you’ll be one of the few here pushing the blame to others.
And someone, so what if yuying deserved to get into top4? Competition is all about winning and losing. If they so happened to have lost and didn’t have the opportunity to get into top4, they really have no one but themselves to blame.
And forgive me for correcting ‘(:’
As you commented, if Fairfield wanted to help presby then why they played in that match? Must well walked over, safe time or why he didn’t asked the players to stand there and just do nothing? He even bother to change players who did not performed well that day.
to J.T 🙂 –
for goodness sake again, i said if. 🙂 i told you, there are two sides of the incident. you cant do anything if i choose to believe the other side of the story.
and hello, this is a comment kinda thing that everybody can post their say, their opinions. if you dont agree with it, just be firm at your stand, why bother to ask people to keep their mouth shut ? thats real rude of you.
and get this right, its not about sportsmanship. its about the fairness of this competition, its about our own views. 🙂
In my opinion, it is depends on the Fairfield whether he wants who to play, those reserve players always wish to play in important match and thats why they are in the team. It is a freedom what to do and think, but some people comments, seems to make Fairfield coach to be bad reputation.
And opening this title is so un-sportsmanship, wants to see an ugly side of a human. Saying unpractical things to make bad relationship between people. What done is done, what is the point?
so conclusion:
yuying will be out of top 4.
its their own fault & stop pushing the blame to fairfield for being “helpful” to phs black!
If you’re saying that fairfield and presby ganged up, then lemme ask who the hell on earth are you to say this? What makes you think that the two schools are very close? So, if you don’t know anyth about this whole thing then just keep your mouths shut and stop saying that fairfield sorta did this on purpose. Because that’s not the main point of this whole thing. Just have some sportsmanship for goodness sake.
Sorry wrong assumption.
like what you’ve said, lose means lose. its their own fault for not being your so called ‘ on-form ‘ on that day. (:
hmm, but pardon me for saying this. in competitions, shouldnt the stronger team gets to go further? i mean, in such a situation.
yes, they shouldnt blame since its over. but i shall go straight to the point. the main point here is, did fairfield help presby? or was it fairfield’s coach really wanted the reserves to gain experience. there are two side of this whole incident you see.
if its really wanting the reserves to gain more experience, then its okay.
but what if its the other reason? helping presby to get in instead of playing ‘real’. isnt it unfair for the team who is going to be out just because of the opponents’ personal connections? :\
Then it’s really too bad? Who to blame that they’re not on form? Yuying themselves right. Not on form then it’s your own problem la, blame others for what? So fairfield can still field their main team and lose, then claim that everyone wasn’t on form right? And then again you’ll still blame fairfield and accuse them of cheating right? So whatever it is, unless fairfield won presby, you’ll still say that fairfield and presby ganged up right?
lets see mho’s the sole loser now.
they field in reserves is because they are afriad they get TRASH by presby SECOND TEAM so they put in all RESERVES?
or that presby wanted their medal so badly that they could actually win no matter is RESERVES or MAIN TEAM?
this answer everyone will not know. BUT. i hate people who just say things behind the back and do nothing. YOU ALL FIND YUYING SOLE LOSERS. WHO”S THE SOLE LOSER WHEN THEY NEED EXPOSURE BY BEING LIKE THIS??
YUYING have their every rights in going in semi-finals.
THEY DESERVED IT. MAYBE WE JUST HAVE TO BLAME THEMSELVES FOR HAVING SUCH BAD LUCK.
NO OFFENCE BUT I DID SAY INFRONT OF BOTH TEAMS MY COMMENTS SO I HAVE EVERY RIGHTS TO SAY THIS.
but thats because they not on form that day.
that doesnt means that phs black not as good as yuying players and yuying is better.
even if yuying won phs,
that doesnt means yuying should get into semi instead of phs black!
No matter fairfield win or lose, they will still be helping one team right? No matter what they’re still at fault?
So what if Fairfield fielded a team of reserves? Every player in the team is important, it’s not wrong of the coach to let everyone gain experience from the tournament right? Especially when it’s before the zonals and the fact that many of them may not have played in the tournament much. It’s no use of Yuying blaming others if they don’t even have what it takes to be in the semi-finals. Like ‘haha’ said, they only have themselves to blame and not be such sore losers. Would it make any difference if they keep harping onto this? So what if they’re talking about it and pushing the blame all around? It still wouldn’t make a change to the fact that they’re out. If they’re really so good then they could have depended on themselves to get into the semis and not depend on other schools. Each coach knows what his own players need, and obviously his own players would be more important than other schools’. Right? So, conclusion is, if you’re really so good then depend on yourselves and not on others. Even if you’re out, don’t be such sore losers pushing the blame around.
Some teams train to win, but ultimately they train because they like the game. of course no one like losing, but I felt that if the reserves trained hard all year long and when they are put on court, they gave their best shot, losing is not a problem.
to: haha – hey, but the fact is, yuying won PHS(black). shouldnt they deserve the chance to get into top4 rather than PHS(black)?
& in my opinion,
shouldnt a coach wants his team to win or at least play well for a match even though they’re already out? i mean. its not to win or not, but the attitude towards the game, towards volleyball.
and allow me to say this, why do school teams train? to play well right? why do they need to play well? of course to win in competitions right? or even to win at least one or two teams which are their opponents. who will want to lose? gaining experience is just an excuse for oneself to use when he/she is losing. maybe the coach really wants his reserves to get the chance to play, but who knows? there may be other unexpected reasons.
well, no offence though, all are in my opinion. (:
I feel that the Yuying camp should not put the blame on Fairfield team because they should be responsible for their own qualifying. If they had won all their games, then they would have qualified.
They can only complained if another purposely lose a game, which in this case, I felt that putting in reserves not necessarily means losing.
Putting in lower standards reserves may have decrease the chance of Fairfield winning their game. But if the reserves gave their best shot, why not allow them to play? They have been training hard and they deserved their chances to be on court. If only the best players can play, then there will be no tournament.
I believed that in a game, it is not the quality of the players that matters, but the heart and soul that they put in. Losing a game does not mean ‘throwing’ the school’s face. You have to admit defeat to become a winner.
i totally agree!
what i thought was,
the fairfield coach wasn’t wrong.
since they didn’t had a chance to win anymore,
he could just use this chance to let his reserve players gain some experience on the field.
it’s a benefit for them,
but at the same time, it caused YuYing out of semi-finals.
he was doing it for their advantage,
but ‘helped’ Presbyterian High on the way 🙂
yuying damn sore loser lah.
lose means lose.
its ur own fault that u all are out and not others!
so blame urself!
Hi All,
I’ve been involved in School sports for quite sometime as a coach and I see 2 sides to the coin presented here, and my thoughts are –
One side is that the Fairfield Coach was right in putting his reserves to get everyone a game, since there was ‘no point’ in winning.
The other side is that the coach should have fielded the best team to win and give YuYing a chance in the semis.
The core question is not if Fairfield should have ‘helped’ YuYing, but more the pride of the team, and for the School.
Fielding reserves can be done gradually, and not wholesale, and if done tactically will ensure all have gametime while putting the best side forward.That’s from my exprience as a coach.
Winining is not the goal here, its putting a team that the school and its players will be proud off that counts -nothing else in my book.