The final day, finals and departure (day 15)

All good things somewhere end. We had a Sunday with our captain Jeff still struggeling with his health. While taking a rest after breakfast, he was on his way for some tests in the hospital. Still with fever, almost fainting and not able to attend the final day. 

I went to the venue with an exiting short cotytrip by scooter with my friends from the organisation.

Hong Kong and Australia made an interesting match for bronze. With a strong start Australia took the lead, but failed to score whilst refusing to move and to play the ball. Hong Kong stayed calm and took their shots. Australia lost the game, leaving a fresh and agile moving Asian squad for bronze.

The final between China and Chinese Taipei started with a lot of pressure and scores in the first attacks.

Also here the team with the best start finally did not cope with the momentum of the game, failed to get rid of the pressure and stopped scoring. The yellow squad from the organising country won this final match of the tournament fully deserved.

Af the official closing ceremony of the Asian and Oceania U23 Championships8 players were selected in the All-Star team. Two players were announced as MVP, and of course the medals and the cup was being given to the best thre teams of the tournament.

Time to say goodbye, nowadays selfie time. It was about 5.30 pm that we arrived back at the hotel. A taxi was already waiting for me to bring me to the airport. There I will meet with the staff and the Philippine team, they fly back to Manila an our after I start my trip to Amsterdam.

One time more to say thank you organisation, city of Hsinchu, Korfball Association of Chinese Taipei, the IKF, KNKV and all the volunteers who participated to make this tournament an event not easy to forget.

Xièxiè Hsinchu!

India to play at last (day 14)

Oh, it is just like I have been through in various previous championships, the team performance should work to their maximum perfomance at the end of the tournament. We had some good days, with maybe the first half against Macau as the top.

Still between basket and korf, but the ball starts to be a known friend. Various action seem to be chaotic but are all based on the restriction the rules apply to the game. Players start to grow during our daily training sessions. We have to play, gain experience, but I am so glad we started this roadtrip.

Breakfast - relax - team meeting and departure to the venue. Players are exited, to give their last day some glance with a new chance against India. No nerves, just fun.

And we started without our main scoring player and captain Jeff, some fever left him at his hotel room. But we knew that other players would step up and the team by the hand.

A good start with iron Tyron brought a quick 2-0 lead. India though was the beter team. More forced our defenders to go backwards. Through 10 running in shots and deflicting penalty shots India took a deserved 14-7 half-time lead.

The second half we started to focus on our scoring and we managed to score a record 17 points.

We finished 6th just one spot behind the second biggest (korfball) nation, proud to showed our pride, the tiger cubs just delivered its first growl. We are going to release this animal back and it will grow up and growl again. Will it ever be the king of the Asian forest......? Time will tell.

Of course party, selfies and happy faces, Jeff has to be proud that captain Jessel took so much care of the team today.

Thank you staff for bringing this team to the Championships.

Tomorrow we have the final two matches to decide the medals. Tonight a goodbye to Hsinchu by night. Sunday evening I fly back to Amsterdam.