For all intents and purposes, we were dead and gone. When our coach broke the news to us that ACJC had beaten YJC, by a narrow scoreline of 1-0 in the waning moments of the match, it horrible realisation sunk in. JJC was to be our final game, our swansong, because even if we won our game by 20 goals, as long as ACJC won against TPJC, we were out.
Truth be told, there wasn't much faith amongst the players that we would go through. While all of us wanted to believe deep down inside that we were going through, there was that sinking feeling that we had to face the facts. The despair we felt at the fact that our fate did not rest in our own hands was one of the worst feelings in the world. There are times when you are able to look back at the entire process that has brought you to where you are now, and reflect on the countless hardships, the trials and tribulations you have overcome in order to summon the strength and the courage to aid in you in this one final obstacle between you and sweet victory... This was not one of those times. It was a horrible feeling, one that seemed to sap the strength out of us even before we got onto the pitch.
However, if there was any glimmer of hope, it was that our fixture had been moved to a Monday as JJC's pitch was unavailable of the usual Tuesday as this match had been postponed due to a rainout, whereas ACJC would be playing TPJC at MJC on the usual Tuesday. If we had any advantage, it would be that a win would put all the pressure on ACJC. On the other hand, if we were to slip up against JJC, ACJC would go through to the semi-finals regardless of their performance in their final match.
We knew the task at hand. We had to go to JJC and not just beat them, but beat them by a convincing margin in order to send a message to ACJC to remind them that we were still there. JJC were out of the tournament, but as always, they were playing for pride, having lost three times in front of their home crowd, we knew that they intended to hold that number at three, and if there was anything that would cap off a disappointing campaign, it would be a victory over Raffles Junior College. During the training on Saturday, our coach told us that the JJC coach had asked him to convey this message to us: "If your boys want it, they have to come and take it from us". Our coach proceeded to write this message in capital letters on the whiteboard of the briefing room, and left it there for us until the match-day to remind us. JJC were not going to lie down and take it, and had issued us a challenge: If you want it, come and take it.
The line-up: Timon, Junliang, Eugene, Cunzhi, Zenzel, Yijing, Martin, Hashir, Woohan, Sean and Chaolun.
During the pre-match briefing, I was written in at the traditional AM position. After some laughs and pats on the backs, I learnt that our coach wanted me to play higher up the field this time to apply pressure on the JJC defensive midfielder. Just like our previous game against them, our teacher in charge had identified their 2 midfielders as the main threats, but instead of me taking the Attacking Midfielder as I had in the first game, I was to take the DM. Based on sheer form, I would have to say this was as strong a side as we could field.
On the way to JJC, I could sense the tension. Everyone spoke a little less on the bus, there were less jokes, and everyone seemed a little grim. I think one of the hardest things about the A Division soccer season is the sheer length of it. Some other CCAs have competitions that last a day, or a few days, or maybe a week, or perhaps a little longer like the Rugby season. But to my knowledge, no other CCA in at the Junior College level has a season as long and as demanding as the soccer one. We play two matches a week, for an entire month, and after that the surviving teams still have to play the semi-finals and the finals. We trained on Monday, played a match on Tuesday, did a little bit of weights on Wednesday and had video debrief, trained on Thursday, played on Friday, and trained on Saturday as well. While I guess having a long season ensures that your year's worth of training will at least amount to 8 matches, it is really draining. I could see signs of that fatigue in my teammates, perhaps if we had already secured qualification there wouldn't be any fatigue but just excitement, but that was not the case. I don't mean to exaggerate it by saying that people were falling asleep or passing out from exhaustion, but you could see it in the little things, being flat-footed during warmups, that little droop of the shoulders when a pass went astray, or just the lack of a strong voice. When you really think about it, it's an enormous feat, the ability to muster up the adrenaline day in day out, to psyche yourself up for every match, to be full of energy.
Anyway, back to the match. I didn't really realise this during the match, but after watching the video, I realised that the first half against JJC was perhaps the worst defensive performance from us the entire season. JJC must have had at least 10 decent scoring opportunities, and if not for Timon in goal, we could have been down 2 or 3 by the break. I guess I really have to give credit to Timon here, he really kept us in the game with an amazing performance in the first half, and I think he played the match of his life here. He must have had at least 8 to 9 saves throughout the entire game. Things just weren't clicking for us. In the midfield, I have to say that Hashir and I found ourselves in an unfamiliar situation, with me playing higher up for the first time. Furthermore, I was having absolutely no effect on the DM as I was not able to stop him from distributing the ball, simply because he wasn't getting much of the ball. Everytime he won the ball from our forwards, he simply cleared the ball first time before I could put in a challenge, and offensively I was unable to contribute. Hashir on the other hand, was being forced further and further back to track the AM, and the forwards were able to help apply pressure on him so he got even less time on the ball. Defensively, I don't really know what happened, but safe to say, it wasn't their best game.
Halfway through the first half however, we had a breakthrough. Chaolun's break into the box drew a sliding tackle from the JJC defender, and we won a penalty. As Cunzhi stepped up to take the penalty that would give us a much-needed lead, I crossed my fingers and told the players on the edge of the penalty box to focus on the second-ball, while at the same time praying that they would not need to. Sadly, Cunzhi failed to convert the spotkick, and the keeper saved it. Perhaps he was not the best candidate to take the penalty, having narrowly avoided the keeper against TPJC, but nevertheless he was the captain and was handed the responsibility.
When the half-time whistle blew, I knew we were in for a shelling. I knew how badly we were playing, and I was frankly exhausted as I made my way towards our bench. I had been chasing the DM all around the pitch, and neither of us had made much of an impact on the game, and I had to admit he had gotten the better of me on a few occasions. As we gathered under the shelter, my mind was in a haze. All of a sudden, our coach took a bottle of H2O and threw it so hard on the floor that the bottle cap flew off and the bottle exploded, splashing H2O on a few of my teammates who had been unfortunate as to sit at the front. If anything, this really woke me up. He shouted at us for a while, but I didn't really register what he was saying as I was still in a bit of shock, and all I knew was that he was seething in anger and with good cause. At the end of the scolding, I was ready to get onto the pitch and turn things around. I guess sometimes a good-old fashioned tongue lashing is just what the doctor ordered. However, before I stepped back onto the pitch, I went up to our coach and told him that I thought that Hashir and I should revert back to our old position and I should take the AM while Hashir should push higher up the field. The coach agreed with me and relented, and in my opinion, this would prove a winning decision that would change the match.
Shortly after the restart, we took the lead. Someone drew a foul on the right channel, and Zenzel took his trademark stutter step run up before delivering an excellent cross into the box, which Sean bundled in for his 3rd goal of the tournament. We had finally taken the lead. In the minutes after, both teams would trade blows, with JJC stepping up the tempo in search of an equaliser. Soon, the deciding moment of the match would come.
An inswinging corner by JJC from the left side was met by a JJC head and nodded down to straight to the feat of their striker, not the African one, and from less than 6 yards out he unleashed a first time shot straight at our goal. Timon made the save of the season, reacting almost instantaneously to block the shot with his chest. The ball dribbled out to yet another JJC player, and with Timon on the ground after saving the intial shot, the goal was at his mercy. However, this time it was Junliang to the rescue, having been standing at the farpost during the corner, he reacted quickly as well and was quickly off his line, and made a sliding tackle using his body to smother the shot completely. The ball bounced away from our goal and straight to Yijing's feet. After controlling the ball and holding it, he released the ball to a rampaging Zenzel, who had reacted first to the counter-attack and had broken free on the left flank, after sprinting and bringing up the ball pass the halfway line, he delivered an excellent left foot cross to Sean, who was the furthest player during the corner, and had snuck in between the two centre backs. The cross just floated above the outstretched foot of the first centre-back, and straight to Sean's feet. After controlling the ball, he dropped his right shoulder making it seem that he was about to shift the ball to his right foot for a shot, instead cutting back to his left foot, and having created some space for himself, he delivered a left foot shot into the top left corner of the goal, capping a flowing move with a brilliant finish. From going close to conceding a goal, we doubled our tally with a textbook counter-attack. It had only been 10 seconds since the moment Yijing touched the ball to the moment the ball hit the back of the net, a splendid goal that was my pick for our goal of the season.
Soon after, Bowen came on for Hashir, and Bowen increased our margin and took his tally to 4. It began with some good work by Sean, who had chased down a ball that the defender had tried to let out for a goalkick before winning it and squaring it into the box. Bong tried to take a near-post shot first time but it was blocked by an excellent tackle by the JJC centre-back, but unfortunately for him his efforts were not rewarded as the ball rolled out only to the feet of Bowen, who calmly slotted it into the bottom left hand corner for a cool finish. Soon afterwards, Bowen would attempt a 20 yard volley that the keeper did well to hold on to. Guan Koon came on for Woohan and would take increase the margin to 4, scoring our first and only goal from a corner. Yijing took an inswinging corner from the right side, and for once, the RJC head that met the ball was able to keep it down, and although this time Guan Koon glanced the ball off his own shoulder before it went in, it was still his goal.
With the match in the bag, our coach decided it was time to let everyone get a chance at playing, and took both Timon and myself off. Weizhi got his first taste of A Division football, and even though JJC scored a goal past him, it was not his fault. In my opinion, the second goal had decided the match, and scoring so soon after they nearly equalised really broke the JJC players' spirits. I remember their captain trying to urge the players on, but his attempts to gather his teammates voices only fell on deaf ears, and even after a while he started getting frustrated, complaining that he could not hear his teammates' voices. The frustration even got to their coach, who was so furious that he was shouting at his players from the sidelines, a fact which I pointed out to my teammates while I was still on the pitch only to receive an icy glare from the JJC coach. After the final whistle, before we could shake the JJC coach's hand and offer our congratulations to the JJC players, they disappeared into the changing room to receive a hairdryer treatment from their coach. Their season had ended on a very sour note.
As for us, as estatic as we were about our second half performance, where we had blitzed JJC for 4 goals, we headed back to school with heavy hearts as everything now rested on the next day's match between TPJC and ACJC. It was not a time to celebrate, but a time to pray.
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The next day was pure torture. Every lesson seemed to last a lifetime, and our coach had forbidden us from going to watch the matches ourselves. So all we could do was wait in school, for news that had a foreboding weight. I was in the canteen with Yijing and the J1s when they first broke the news to me, TPJC were up 1-0! I couldn't believe it, and refused to believe it until I confirmed it with at least 3 different sources. While I paced nervously up and down the canteen, walking to and fro from the canteen to the stadium, the seconds seemed to take hours to tick by. I later learnt that the rest of the soccer team had been in the library and time seemed to drag on as slowly for them as well. They had gathered around Timon's handphone, as he had friends at the match who were keeping him updated as to the scoreline. Soon, news that ACJC had equalised shortly before half-time reached us, yet by that point in time we had seen our glimmer of hope and were not going to let it go without a fight.
All thoughts of work were cast out the window, and everyone just sat there waiting for news of the match, watching time whittle away while silently hoping that Timon's phone would remain silent for the remainder of the match. No news was good news. In all honesty, any news would most likely be news that ACJC had taken the lead. Lady Luck smiled kindly upon us that day, and soon TPJC would take the lead against ACJC through a penalty! If there was ever a time to pray, this was it.
I don't think even soap-opera writers could come up with material as tense as this, because with 15 minutes to go, ACJC equalised through a penalty again. The score was 2-2, which was enough for us to go through to the semi-finals. As we waited with bated breath, Timon called his friend at the match for live updates, and when he called it was deep into injury time. I don't know the exact sequence of events, but essentially shortly after Timon called, his friend informed him that the match had ended, somewhat anti-climactically.
We were through. I had to say it out loud a few times before it sunk in.
We were through. We were going to face VJC in the semi-finals. Maybe it was karma, it was this exact same situation last year with our seniors. Going into their last match against MJC, they were held to a draw needing a victory to secure qualification into the semi-finals. They had to sit on their hands as they awaited a favourable result the following day when SAJC played... TPJC! Yes, it was again a match against TPJC last year that would decide the fate of my senior batch, who were a single point ahead of SAJC. Having a superior goal difference, as long as SAJC faltered and failed to secure a victory, they would have gone through to face VJC. If this is not karma, I don't know what is.
Yes, it's true that the only reason why we got into the semi-finals was because ACJC slipped up on the final day, and that we didn't seal a place in the semi-finals by our own means. But such is the nature of football, sometimes winning just isn't enough and you just have to hope that fortune favours you. All credit to ACJC, they fought hard and had they won their last match, they would deservedly be in the semi-finals. But in the end, it was us, not them.
Fate had offered us a date with destiny, and we were not going to turn her down. A year's worth of training, blood and sweat were now behind us, and only 2 more matches stood between us and immortality. Everything that had happened in the group stages was now dross and trash, the slate had been wiped clean. Goal difference, points, goals scored... all these were now irrelevant. It was now knock-out, winner takes all. We'd conquered the first mountain, against all odds. Dare we dream of taking that second mountain by ourselves?
