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Bangkok Veterans League Season #4, Month #1 03/Feb/2008 • Harrow School |
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Feb/2008 Vets League Top Cup falls back into the laps of Cosmos |
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Date: 05/Feb/2008
What a wonderful kickoff to a new season — our biggest ever 22-team day of football that worked like a Swiss clock! We started on time and finished before the dusk. I can't remember a punctual tournament day like this in recent memory.I will go out on a limb here, and claim that the agreements made in the Captains Conference on Jan/30th resulted in tangible benefits in the overall running of the whole tournament. Of course, I could say that more helping hands would be appreciated, but [20 Baht] I was happy with the help I got from Graham (Winking Frog), Roland (BSL), Dino (Swiss) and Sirichai (Yingcharoen). First time giving it a try with 22 teams, and a total of 75 matches, I was apprehensive whether it will work out or not, but [20 Baht] was happy to see it all turned out for the best. There were clearly a number of strong teams — Winking Frog, Cosmos and LesGaulois (in Group-B together), the 2 Turkish teams (in Group-C together), defending Champ! Harrow Cooks, Yingcharoen, Campioni. Finding Cosmos (with full squad this time!), Anatolia (with Anders in the attack for them!), and Harrow Cooks (with the same nimble group of players from Dec/2007) at 15 points at the end of the Group Stage was a good indication how it will go. However [20 Baht], Cup Division QFs were not friendly to Yingcharoen, Winking Frog, Campioni, and Harrow Cooks, losing out to LesGaulois, Anatolia, Cosmos, and Turkish Allstars respectively. In the Shield Division, new-comers Rockets, common-faces Amadeus, and old-timers Germans were making waves, while in the boondoggle Bowl Division, the new-mix Eton and the new-offshoot BSL Apprentices (and their bigger-brothers BSL Originals) as well as the usual suspect British Club / LeCoq / BUJ tripartite were fighting it out to not win the much coveted BadCup! At the end of the day, BSL Apprentices didn't pass the opportunity to win the BadCup! on their "first-ever" entry in the Vets, firmly snatching it away from LeCoq  The heated battle in the Cup Division lead to a Cosmos -vs- LesGaulois matchup in the Grand Final, a repeat of the Apr/2007 Grand Final, but this time, saw Cosmos finishing victorious, much like their earlier clash in this month's Group Stage. And, arguably, in the most interesting match of the day, Anatolian Turks faced off (a very non-Turkish) Turkish Allstars in the 3rd place match before which all the players had to be body-searched as a precautionary measure. In the end, Anatolia triumphed with a narrow but [20 Baht] exciting 1-0 score to repeat their 3rd place achievement from Aug/2007. When the dust settled, the following were the full list of rankings, the winners joyful in their well-earned trophies, and the losers enjoying their hard-fought beer-bucket coupons from our new sponsor, DownUnder Sports Bistro in Sukhumvit Soi 23. 1) Cosmos <== Champ! 2) LesGaulois <-- beer-bucket! 3) Anatolian Turks <-- beer-bucket! 4) Turkish Allstars <== FairPlay! 5) Yingcharoen <== Plate! 6) Harrow Cooks <-- beer-bucket! 7) Winking Frog 8) Campioni 9) Rockets <== Shield! 10) Amadeus <-- beer-bucket! 11) Germans 12) Japan FC 13) Enfant 14) Harrow Teachers 15) Medicals 16) Swiss 17) BSL Originals <== Bowl! 18) Eton 19) British Club 20) BU Japan 21) LeCoq 22) BSL Apprentices <== BadCup! Here's the complete scores of the day ==>  Congratulations to all the teams and players who took part in Vets League's 4th season opening tournament of 2008, and to Cosmos for kicking off the season with a firm championship under their belt, which I'm sure will go a long way in maintaining their season-champions achievement from 2007, as well as, perhaps, surpassing Vikings's 4-in-a-row consecutive wins record from 2006 season. I'd like to thank everyone who showed up and had a good time, as well as those who helped in the organization. Because of the mammoth 22-team tournament this month, I didn't find time to test my new Ronaldinho-10 wheels, but [20 Baht] watch out, I'll be out there on the pitches soon, making countless masterful assists and scoring multitude of spectacular goals for the teams that want to employ my skills in the rest of the season Looking forward to the next edition on Mar/2nd. Kind regards, -Eralp Website: http://www.vetsleague.com/ Community: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/vetsleague/ |
| Photos: |
 Picture 1 — Captains in the Captains Meeting at the beginning of the day.  Picture 2 — Captains declaring their underage players in an "honest" way.  Picture 3 — Our Referee Master, Kh. Bang, receiving his recognition trophy from Dec/2007 for his services to the Veterans League throughout the years.  Picture 4 — Some of the influential Captains of the Vets League — Eric and Roland (BSL Originals), Ralf (Germans), Marc (BSL Apprentices), Neset (Turkish Allstars).  Picture 5 — Newcomers (non-Turkish) Turkish Allstars in their distinctive Ordu shirts, lead by their only-Turkish Captain, Neset (the chap with the hair implants!).  Picture 6 — Newbies, Eton Rifles — a collection of players from British Club, Irish Xchange and John Smiths, enjoyed their "first-ever" run in the Vets and finished a strong 18th overall.  Picture 7 — The ever-present British Club pulled out another successful tournament — 19th overall!  Picture 8 — Newcomers Triumph Rockets finished the day with the Shield! (9th overall) trophy.  Picture 9 — Eventual champions, Cosmos, in their lucky yellow bibs.  Picture 10 — BU Japan and Winking Frog preparing for their group fixture kickoff.  Picture 11 — LesGaulois invading the Admin Tent, in search of more points for the Group Stage.  Picture 12 — The "Original" half of BSL Veterans.  Picture 13 — The new offshoot "Apprentice" half of BSL Veterans.  Picture 14 — Rockets's David and his family enjoying the day thoroughly.  Picture 15 — "Le Bleu" LeCoq French caught in their reds "first-ever" time.  Picture 16 — A strong title contender Anatolian Turks in their new white kits, with Vikings's Anders in their attack this month.  Picture 17 — Swiss United in action, always punctual to their various games around the Harrow venue.  Picture 18 — A dejected Winking Frog after their loss to Anatolia in the Cup QFs.  Picture 19 — The defending Champ! Harrow Cooks looked confident again, especially with the Formula-1 Trophy Girls on their side.  Picture 20 — Enfant Teenagers, with their influential Captain Kh. Ning in the middle, posing with teenage Formula-1 Trophy Girls.  Picture 21 — Rather serious looking Medical Gear could finish 15th overall this month.  Picture 22 — LesGaulois's Eric finding time to entertain his son in between games.  Picture 23 — A jubilant LesGaulois went all the way to the Grand Final this month, losing to Cosmos at the very end.  Picture 24 — BU Japan, with their huge squad, is enjoying the day, bringing home the 20th overall ranking and no BadCup! this month.  Picture 25 — A special bonus shot for an all-smiles Otsuki San with the Formula-1 Trophy Girls.  Picture 26 — Yingcharoen Standby had a strong run this month, winning the Plate! (5th overall) trophy.  Picture 27 — All the silverware, and more, raring to go!  Picture 28 — BU Japan's Mori San and Germans's Bruce joyous in receiving their "Half Century" trophies left over from Dec/2007 trophy presentations.  Picture 29 — Anatolia's Beyhan, flanked by his lovely wife, receiving their Plate! (5th overall) trophy from Dec/2007.  Picture 30 — And, here we go, Marc and BSL Apprentices swiftly steal the BadCup! of the month.  Picture 31 — Roland for BSL Originals proud with their Bowl! (17th overall) trophy, and more.  Picture 32 — Rockets's Steve appear satisfied with with their Shield! (9th Overall) trophy — 1 worse than last month, but it's a silverware to take home.  Picture 33 — Yingcharoen's Sirichai getting a shot with their Plate! (5th overall) trophy and the Formula-1 Trophy Girls.  Picture 34 — Anatolia's Yilmaz, in place of Turkish Allstars's Neset, picking up their FairPlay! (4th overall) trophy from Martin.  Picture 35 — Beyhan back in the frame, this time, picking up their 3rd place award — a free beer-bucket coupon from our new sponsor DownUnder.  Picture 36 — LesGaulois, finishing 2nd overall, pick up their free beer-bucket coupon.  Picture 37 — A seemingly blush Harold proud with Cosmos's first championship of the new season, but we're sure many more to come.  Picture 38 — A nice-touch group photo at the end of the day. |
| Links: |
| • Summary at AAFC.hk |
| Feedbacks: |
| From: Graham Team: Winking Frog Date: 03/Feb/2008 Thanks for today. It was a mammouth tournament. GE |
| From: Thierry Team: Campioni Italians Date: 03/Feb/2008 Great organization today EG. No time lost between the games. 22 teams and finishing 6:00 pm. That's great achievement. Well done !! Thierry |
| From: Steve Team: Harrow Teachers Date: 05/Feb/2008 Cheers EG, great tournament on Sunday as usual, and thanks for the discount. See you next month. Cheers, Steve |
| From: Dino Team: Swiss United Date: 05/Feb/2008 Dear EG, The thanks go to you for this memorable first tournament in 2008! We still have room for improvement, but all in all a fantastic day! Cheers, Dino |
| From: Dominique Team: LeCoq French Date: 07/Feb/2008 Dear EG, Unbelievable! It was pure magic; this tournament was the best ever for LeCoq and yet, the worst ever for Le Score, if you see what i mean! Our team is Francophone in reality, and we have a guest player list with standing invitations with one guest player only at this time, Keith, who is happy to join us when he has no team. So , feel free to join us whenever you like. Dominique |
Feel free to e-mail to me if you would like to voice your take on the above summary, or would like to obtain the original resolution pictures. |
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