On arrival at the Kalverdijkje sports centre, we needed to prepare quickly and efficiently to take on China. In tribute to our host club, to acknowledge everything they have given us over the past week, and to celebrate their victory last evening, we warmed up in our red and black DOS ’46 club shirts. As usual, our wonderful supporters were on the tribunes urging us on.
We settled into the game quickly and took an early lead when pressure forced China to turn over the ball out of their own defence and Chelsea converted a good opportunist chance. Although China rallied for an early fight back, we managed to counter their game plan by closing down their quick girls and stopping them feeding their boys on the outside, forcing them to time out the shot clock repeatedly, or to make basic errors and give up more turnovers, which proved to frustrate them even further. In attack our structure held firm, yielding more goals to build a 5-2 half time advantage.
At the start of the second half we conceded a quick goal to reduce the lead to just two goals. However, Juliet and Kendall realised that the Chinese coach had switched a number of players between sections at the interval, and by the time the officials had sorted out the mess, the Chinese goal was struck off and the second half restarted from the beginning. Once the game recommenced, we kept our cool, while the Chinese players struggled to deal with the situation. We kept building to close out the game at 12-5, a score that meant New Zealand had beaten China for the first time ever at any level of international korfball, as well as guaranteeing that we would finish in the top ten, and as the second highest team from outside Europe, whatever the outcome of our next match.
Our final game to determine our tournament ranking was against the Czech Republic, one of the longest established korfball nations outside The Netherlands and Belgium, and the only one outside those two to ever contest a gold medal match at a senior World or European Championship, so a formidable opponent with serious korfball credentials. While we competed well, particularly at the start of the game, and managed to make some good goals, we were unable to match the intensity of the Czech players, and particularly their tall boys, for long enough periods, and slipped from 8-4 behind at half time to 18-4 on the final whistle.
Therefore we finished the tournament in tenth position. Once our final game was over, we were able to relax and watch the higher ranked teams play out the remains of the tournament: all the results are on the tournament website at http://www.u19kwc.com/results/.
On the way through a number of people complemented us for our effort: credible and deserving of respect on our first appearance at this event. Meanwhile the tournament organisers encouraged us to return next year, though that is a decision for another day.
While we didn’t feature in the medals at the closing ceremony, we were extremely proud and pleased when Chelsea’s performance over the past three days earned her the recognition as the tournament’s MVP emerging female player. Congratulations Chels and well deserved: we love you!
As the first week of our journey ends, we have much excitement in store for the week ahead. We will be playing another match against a team from Korfball League club Blauw-wit that will be followed by watching the third-leg of their semi-final against TOP. The winner will be heading to the Korfball League final in Ahoy and so will we! As our final korfball act in the Netherlands we will be part of a 10,000+ strong crowd watching the holy grail of korfball games. It won’t all be korfball though with plenty of tourist activities planned for the week as well. We will keep you updated until the end of the tour.
Tot morgen,
Rob and Bevan