Monday, October 20, 2008

Lessons in Foul Calling

It's been a while since DojoMojo defeated a full-strength Messy Bugs lineup, but Round 4 of the current BPL season saw the Dojo return to form and roll in a pretty straightforward 15-10 victory against the old Bug foes.

[To those that have complained about this post being too long in the making we do extend our apologies - normal service will be resumed shortly, and with Mixed Nationals happening over the weekend we figured few would notice...]

So - what to say about the game? Well - on reviewing the footage it has to be said that there were only very few flashes of real high-quality play (and several instances of the opposite...). Most of the 80 minutes was spent in the conventional manner against this tough Bugs team - struggling for psychological, rather than physical superiority. Just witness the finals coverage from last season to see how normally-great players (and even Julian Sacre) can crumble under the mental pressure of the red-shirted Bugs.

But not the Dojo. At least not this week... Cheeks were turned and implosions were avoided as the goals just kept on being caught (barring the odd Wetnose block). To make up for the slightly lower-than-usual spectacle of athleticism that last week's game was, we've taken a few editing liberties to ramp up the controversy a bit instead. The handy film work was as usual done by Marijke Walls, who as you'll hear is able to carry out a conversation about home decorating and film a game of Ultimate simultaneously. Looking forward to receiving the comments on this one:



If the title of this post didn't make sense before then presumably it does now? Some interesting exchanges there, especially the sideline comments from J-Ray and the response from Stefan, but most were resolved in the well-spirited manner typical of BPL play. In fact all this video coverage has got us thinking that knowing the world may be watching is a sure way to keep the Spirit bar high.

We couldn't resist scrutinising at least one Wetnose call either - hopefully he'll drop by shortly to share some of his own views on the game.

And that'll have to be it for now. To the right you can see that we've devised a new voting system that we're calling "Above & Beyond". It's similar to the old MVP system, but it differs in that it rewards individuals for exceeding their own standard of play, rather than that of their teammates. So vote for whoever you thought had a cracking game, regardless of whether they were the best on the field or not...

5 comments:

  1. In fairness to wetnose, the video doesn't really show a little push-off I gave him.

    As to what extent that it was a foul or how it should usually be handled (turnover?), I'm not sure. Anyway - best left on the field - he had a good game.

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  2. great work sensei....
    another exceptional entry.

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  3. Thanks for the cheap shot Sensei - you just couldn't help yourself, could you?

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  4. Just gunna put it out there, but was that last hammer really necessary, quite sure a backhand was pretty open. Next time we play I'm just gunna stick both hands in the air on the mark.

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  5. Thanks for the comments everyone, but Pete - I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean by "was that last hammer really necessary".

    Watch any of our video footage and you'll see that the hammer is the default throw taught to all kenshi from the moment they enter the Dojo. We only ever throw backhands, flicks etc on the rare occasions that a hammer (or scoober) isn't an option.

    Anyway, hope that clears things up for you.

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