Thanks Derek! A Free Lesson in Football.

I learned something on Friday that I felt is worth sharing. And I would say "learning" was far from what I experienced. I was amazed as well. KDU went up against Traders Hotel that day in a friendly match, and Heng, Keong and I filled-in for the absent players. The KDU team, I felt, was not the strongest team Derek had that day. They were missing Kugan and Fajar, two stalwarts, and a host of other first-teamers.

Anyway, before the match started, Derek gave very clear instructions: "Listen everyone, this is just a friendly. I'm not bothered about the score and the goals. I just want everyone to pass the ball around. Just pass it." Simple, concise and effective. And KDU did just that. Traders Hotel were being pulled apart by simple, two-to-three touch passing. (KDU won 5-0 by the way)

It hit me then; with limited resources, and up against a slightly more physically-superior team, KDU played beautiful football. At one moment, it seemed that we were the perfect exponents of the Spanish team at Euro 2008! We were organized and rarely gave the ball away. Our opponents on the other hand were getting tired fast, what with all that ball chasing. Now, with more experienced players, a technically gifted midfield, power-packed strikers and fleet-footed defenders, why can't Ramblers emulate that? I'm not taking anything away from Ramblers as a team - we are fantastic. But we owe our success more to dogged determination than anything else. I just feel that, maybe, we could play smarter by first keeping things simple; just like Derek did with KDU. We have no plans when we go out and play friendlies either. The closest we've ever come to a tactical strategy was against CRC... probably our BEST game this year despite the lost. But for the most part, it's “Pump the ball to Vespa”. That seems to be our mantra. Our midfield is under-utilized because we're PUMPING the ball forward most of the time. Therefore, when we lose the ball upfront, we're exposed on the wings because our wingers have sprinted forward in support of “Vespa”. And then they're supposed to sprint back alllllll the way down in support of our full-backs. I don't think any team in the world has such dynamic wingers... not for 90 minutes! Football isn't just about winning and tackling and all that hurly-burly masculine stuff. It's also about learning and growing. Simple question: what have we learn when we're playing a friendly? I know we've got loads of opinions after. But what have we taken out from the game? Ask yourselves that... honestly! I'm even wondering, is more training sessions gonna help? Yeah, it gives us a chance to gel as a team but is it really enough? Is this a mental problem, a tactical puzzle or is it more of a trust issue? We've got to develop a style of play, an identity, and it starts from our friendly games. Maybe Derek should just drop by.