The Quarterfinals! YES!

Updated: The Khaleej Times article on the quarterfinals...

Quarterfinals:

Modern: 2
Anish - 32'
Charan - 58'

Delhi Private School, Jebel Ali: 1
The 'Captain' - 20'

Hypocritical luck was again hypocritical today. It didn't trip us, but it kicked Our Own, Al Warqaa out. Clearly the most dominating team, Our Own, Al Warqaa were devastated to be kicked out by the poor Indian High School team by the cruelest of settlers - the dreaded penalty shoot-out. A team that scored 10 goals in 3 matches lost to a team that scored 0 goals in their group matches. Unbelievable. Damn, I feel for them. Because of Our Own, Al Warqaa, we progressed through the group stages, and now we have progressed to the semis, while they have stumbled. So this bit is just a tribute to them. Well played guys, you were just unlucky.

Our match was different. A poor 1st half was capped by a 40 yard free-kick from the DPS, Sharjah captain that passed into the net over our goalkeeper. Annoyed and suppressed, we came out in the second half more pumped up then ever, almost as if to throw back the suppression on our opponents' face. And we did just that. A brilliant move, that involved a one-two between Aaron and me, led to our first goal. I won the ball in midfield, played it to Aaron, who supplied me a sublime, first-touch, backheeled pass, which I received on the run, I then glided past a couple of defenders and slotted home the equalizer. 2 minutes - that's all it took. From then on, the scenario changed completely. We dominated, winning more balls in midfield and by making less errors. Edwin put on a strong performance, anchoring the midfield and defence by not allowing any ball to seep through. The defence looked more solid, and Bharath made a couple of good reaction saves. On the other end, I hit the bar twice. The first instance was when Romit fed be lovely ball, and I tried to lift it over the goalkeeper, only to strike the bar. In the second instance, my pace beat the defence, but my finish could only hit the inside of the post. How that didn't go in? - I will never know! Charan also had a couple of brilliant chances. At one time, he was clean through with only the keeper to beat, but he stumbled under pressure. Aaron also came close with a volley. It seemed to be just one of those days.

Anyway, 2 minutes before the end, Dusty sweeped in a long ball from the right flank, and Charan pushed it into the goal with a left footed volley. Brilliant. A last minute stunner. We flipped. Nirmal, our young substitute, ran onto the field without the knowledge of the officials. Our coach flipped. Charan almost got squeezed to death. Everyone lost their voices, screaming - it was sheer jubilation, one of those moments where you feel like you cannot possibly be more happy and when you think that your lives truly rock.

However, what followed wasn't a merry sight. The referee put in 10 additional minutes. 10! Yes 10 whole minutes! Even professional matches don't add on so much time. Our coach was going insane on the touchline. All the passion and anger was oozing out. It almost seemed that the referees were against us. But we tried to derive as much pleasure as we could from the extra 10 minutes by employing all the possible time-wasting techniques. Aaron, Dusty and I took the ball to the corner flag and shielded it, annoying the hell out of the other team.

The final whistle was finally sounded, and we freaked out, like a bunch of teenage girls, hugging, kissing, laughing - and then we stretched - to warm down our worn out legs. We have our semi-finals tomorrow. Aaron has taken a knock, and almost everyone has some niggling pain or the other. But once we are on the field, the adrenalin rush is just too strong, all the pain seeps away, and we have this new 'josh' in ourselves.

Basically, I am really excited and cannot seem to stop typing. Let me just conclude by saying that we will try our best in the semis, and reaching the finals would be dream-like - so we'll give it our all. And guys, all of you, thank you so much for the support. It means a lot to us. I hope you guys can come to watch the match. Support is always good! But "you can't miss your classes". Obviously.

P.S. The long detailed post is for memory, a few years down the line, for me, and for the team. So please forgive and ignore if you are bored. =)