That’s all there is, there isn’t any more. This is my last post (for this tournament at least), and we are all headed home, or onto our further travels. This is a very delayed post, due to the after-party and the aforementioned travel.
The final day of the tournament was in essence a free day for us, as we unfortunately weren’t playing. While we had aspirations of playing on the final day, it wasn’t to be this time. After a delayed start to the day, and with a few sore heads (both thanks to the previous nights celebrations), we headed into the Lotto Arena, in time to watch both of the medal matches. The playoff started earlier than other matches this tournament, in order to make the final match at a more palatable time for the crowd. The third place match was somewhat predictable, with Chinese Taipei running out 21 -12 winners over England. Both teams played hard, with Taipei simply out-running and out-shooting England.
The final, between Belgium and the Netherlands was easily the best game of korfball I have ever watched. Along with the great match was an amazing atmosphere. With close to 5000 people in the stands, and plenty of rivalry between the opposing groups of fans, this was the only korfball match I have ever been at where I couldn’t hear the whistle. The match had everything, from outstanding shooting, missed penalties, yellow cards and the closest thing to a fight I’ve seen on a korfball court since, well, we played Poland a few days ago. While the final scoreline (18-27) suggests the Netherlands got an easy win, the scoreline isn’t reflective of the overall match. Belguim stuck within two goals for the majority of the match, and at times threatened to pull off a major upset. In the end, however, the Netherlands were too strong, as was generally expected to be the case.
Following the finals, we all headed off to the after-party, which was held at a local hall. With a live band and a couple of DJs, it was a pretty good party. I’m not going to go into details about what went on, but suffice to say that Australia acquitted ourselves well, and we had a great time.
I am now on the way home, and so this is the last post. I’m glad so many people have been reading these posts, and seem genuinely interested in what’s been going on. The encouragement and feedback has been great, and the support from the readers has been fantastic for the whole team. It really has been a privilege to have so many people from all over the world showing interest in what we are doing. Hopefully we will be able to convince one or more of the U23s to jot something down, as they have the next tournament, in the Czech Republic, next year. Until then, you can stay tunesd to the Facebook page to keep up to date with all the going ons at Korfball Australia.
Until next time, goodbye, and thank-you.
Well done Hutchie on the daily blog posts. Awesome effort and appreciated by many ?
Hutchy….long time reader…first time poster:) Great bloggin job mate. Loved reading the updates and watching the games when I could. You guys did us proud. Well done.
Hi Andrew, Thanks a lot for the daily update, nice to read and gavea good impression of your “adventures”. It was highly appreciated. Congrats and goodbye.
You did an awesome job updating the blog.
Andy, it was a pleasure to read your blog. It’s a real pity that this was the last one. Hope to see you and the team again in Wageningen or somewhere else.