Still here watching the Dodgeball, and while the U21s haven’t got their first win yet, they are getting better with every game. There are clear signs that there is a lot of promise for the future for this young, inexperienced team.
It’s good stuff, and I’m so happy that my boy is part of it.
Off court, there are a lot of smiles and camaraderie between the nations, and the junior and U21 games have been played in great spirit.
Sadly, the same can’t be said of the senior games. There’s been a lot of chat about respect and good sportsmanship after some seriously heated moments yesterday.
Really nasty.
The differing attitudes to coaching are interesting to watch. Of course, everyone’s in it to win it, but the SA guys are also there to play fair. There are smiles, encouragement, support. The Egyptian players and coaches are the same until they don’t like something, then – without exception – it’s full on Jeykell and Hyde stuff. Kloppesque whine mode engaged: at the refs, the players, sometimes the fans, often some deity or other. It’s regularly been genuinely unpleasant.
Nah then, Mardybum.
And disappointingly, you can see it running off on some of the younger players already. A hint of arrogance, a bit of sarcasm, disputing decisions, chirping at the ref.
But then, what do you expect?
There’s a lot more to playing sport than winning. If there wasn’t, no-one would bother doing it. But there are so many life lessons you can learn from this sort of thing and it’s just really sad to see which ones seem to be getting through.