Game Changer
By Olivo Spadotto
It was a dark gloomy day and I was getting ready for my first rugby league tournament. I was really nervous, but at the same time pumped. I had been preparing for this, and I kind of felt like I was getting ready for war.
We arrived there just as the rain started to fall heavier, the clouds hanging low and dark. Just looking at all those big teams against the misty backdrop stirred butterflies in my tummy.
The first team we faced were the Point Chev. Pirates, and - eye, eye me hearty - they were massive. We all looked at each other thinking we had no chance, but actually I noticed that they were good tacklers but slow. Crusher, my teammate playing next to me as a forward, had also clicked on to that and whispered, “Hey, Olivo, they are slow! As long as they don’t catch us we have a chance!”
After 25 mins of being in the dummy half position, I finally was passed to. It was all up to me. I thought I had it, I could see the pathway through. But I ran straight into a player from the opposition who was humongous ……. BANG! Wasted, crushed, winded, the coach peeling me off the ground, asking me, if I needed to sit the last bit out. “No thank you”, I said, “I’m fine.”
Back in the game I’m passed the ball again, but in my way was the guy that took me to the ground moments before. - Painful Pirate! I looked him up and down and ran straight at him, sidestepped at the last possible moment, then the opposite way, span, slipped through under his arm, stepped, stepped, dived and TRY!
I was stoked, my team was stoked.
The score was 10-11.
We won and we all got ice-cream.
After that game I saw rugby from a new perspective: I took risks to win for my team and tried to spin. Fortunately I was successful and that built my confidence for the rest of the season. We won because we analysed the opposition’s game. I will never go back to playing rugby the way I did before that game.
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