Courtesy: Bellingen Courier


A Futsal carnival to remember

by Phil Lynch

Dec. 10, 2012

DAY 1

Game 1
First-up our lads took on Calvary High who, as champions of the million-strong Brisbane area, expected an easy victory over a small town like our’s. But our boys came out guns-a-blazing and raced to a 2-nil lead thanks to Andrew and Ben. Calvary tried to apply some pressure but Jordan scored a great goal to send us into half-time 3-0 up. Unfortunately when we ‘gifted’ them 2 early second half goals, our heads went down, while Calvary lifted. Despite a stunning defensive effort by Ben, Brisbane still added two of their own to steal an undeserved win on the whistle.

Game 2
Bello faced North Qld’s Mackay next. Like game one, Jake and the boys built up well from defence and repeatedly released our forwards to create a multitude of chances. Again like Game 1, we didn’t capitalise on most of them but still coasted to a comfortable 6-4 victory on the back of a 4-goal effort by Andrew.


DAY 2

Game 1
The highs and lows of sport were the order of the day, starting with the crucial match against perennial champs, Chancellor High. At Chancellor, Futsal runs as a School subject with the same amount of class time as English or HSIE. But BHS weren’t over-awed and in another titanic arm-wrestle, the game see-sawed between highly polished Chancellor build-up and electric counter-attack by Andrew & the Snail. The 5-all result was a fair one in what proved to be the most entertaining contest of the competition, but it came at a massive cost with injuries to Andrew, Ezra, Ben and Jordan.

Game 2
Cairns’s Corinda High were unbeaten at the top of the table while we found ourselves stretching to put on 5 fit players to start the match against them. But when the going gets tough, the tough get going and this proved to be Bello’s finest hour. We were led by an incredible effort by Ben who, while absolutely impenetrable defensively, also scored 2 great goals in the first 10 minutes, to get the boys got off to a “flyer”. With a near miss by Kaizin and Asama netting a terrific third, Carinda were rattled. Andrew and Ezra gradually ran out their muscle soreness and netted another 6 between them to completely demolish the Cairns side. So complete was the demoralisation, that Corinda failed to win another match after this 9:3 whitewash.

Game 3
Five fantastic games so far, the euphoric pinnacle of the Corinda game and then came lowly Taree High. They hadn’t won a match and when we played them in August, we thrashed them 9:2. Pride comes before the fall. Overconfidence is a killer and with our walking wounded merely going through the motions, we went 1 down, 1:1, 1:2, 1:3, 1:4 and 1:5 before half time. It was a disaster and even though we eventually fought back to 5:6, the loss was physically and emotionally devastating. We were suddenly out of the top 4 spots, Andrew & Ezra were hobbling, Jordan’s toe was ballooning and Ben looked like missing the next match because of a second Yellow Card.


DAY 3

After a lousy night’s sleep, the day dawned with Ezra immobile, Andrew vomiting and BHS needing at least a draw against Sydney’s Kellyville High to make the semis. Let’s face it, there’s only 4 ½ million people down there to choose from, so their champion team should be a pushover shouldn’t it. Despite that, our boys were sharing the spoils at half time with as much effort as they could muster. Unfortunately we had nothing left in the tank for the second half, so the game and the entire competition, fizzled out 5 goals to our 2.

What a sad way to go! We’d matched or beaten all of the top 4 teams but lost to ones which were our’s to take. But the boys should simultaneously be proud of their efforts. Not only were they a great bunch of guys but they gave everything they had and were arguably the most entertaining attacking side in the comp. They were show-stoppers in undoubtedly the most evenly-matched, intense and emotion-charged carnival that I have ever attended. They were the second most prolific goalscoring team and just one more goal in any of our 4 tight games would have put us in the Finals. Bad luck … but well done!

My congratulations go out to Andrew Trist who was named in the prestigious All Stars Team after the competition.

My thanks go to the parents who came along and supported, with a special thank you to Rico who treated us to a gourmet Italian meal on the last night. Thanks also to those who donated prizes for our raffle and to Diggers Swim Club for the extra $100 to help with expenses. But most importantly, I’d like to thank Liz Hoy, not just for this year, but for her efforts over our entire 10 years of Futsal together. She has been a selfless , tireless worker and the best girl’s coach going.

Thanks again everyone. This was a carnival to remember.






Posted by Luca Ranocchiari --> luca.ranocchiari@futsalplanet.com