big fat bruise on my arm

oh gosh, yesterday's match.

three words to sum it up:
brutal, bitchy, and exhilerating.

first, the scoreline:
we lost 0-39. i think they scored 5 tries and 2 conversions.

second, the opposition:
a completely different ball game from last week. cccc (the handy abbreviation of the college we played against) were waaay more experience, and they had some fast backs who actually knew how and where to run.

my opposite number (their flyhalf, lets call her n.10), for example... what a player. she was tall athletic and well-built, and almost masculine (even though she had long dark hair), but the most outstanding thing about her was her power. man she runs so powerfully. i can't remember her ever being fully tackled during the entire match, such was her ability to sidestep, swerve and power her way through.

so it was a real pity about the...

third: the brutality
cccc were excessive in their aggression.
"but this is rugby!", you say.
all right, so nevermind that they actually pulled a couple of punches. nevermind that they were swearing left, right and centre. nevermind that they kept talking back at the ref ("get it on, ref!") and got warned repeatedly (at least one of them got sin-binned) for various fouls and infringements, nevermind that they apparently made racist remarks (i didn't hear them, but a number of my teammates did. our team is has got at least 5 non-white players, while cccc was completely, well, blanc).

i just can't understand why they had to resort to such uncalled-for, unsportsman-like behaviour, especially since they were winning all the way.

it was a pity that n.10 was one of the worst culprits as well. being a great player doesn't give you the right to be such a #&^@*.

i'm proud of the way our team tried to ignore all the nonsense for most part and played valiantly all the way.

i came this close to scoring in the dying seconds, but two of the defenders pounced upon me 2m from the try line. ah dammit.

yesterday's match made me recall what some people told me before i came to london: (with regards to rugby) "it's all about the heart". i've previously expressed consternation about my size, doubts about my physical power in relation to some of the bigger girls here.

but after yesterday, and last wednesday, i realised that they were right. yes, i would have been able to make more effective tackles if i were bigger and stronger. i can try to make myself stronger, but i'm afraid i can't get any taller at this age ;) and i wouldn't want to get any wider.

but i'm happy that ever since i started playing here, i've tried really hard to make every tackle, to tackle everyone and anyone, and to do it well. and at the end of the day, it's really satisfying to know that even though i missed a few tackles, even though i was powered through by some of the more powerful opposition (e.g. n.10), i tried my damndest, and it made a difference that was recognised and acknowledged by my teammates.

(i was penalised for a high tackle yesterday though, my hand just went for the ball at her chest level, and slid up above the ball to her neck. it looked so intentional, one of my teammates even came up to me after the match to sound me out about it. as someone would say, 'unlucky'.)

i did something cheeky during the early stages of the match - when there was a scrum and it was our feed-in, i stood behind on the left of the scrum at first. then i notice n.10 was directly opposite me, marking me.

so i nipped off to the right of the scrum. surprise surprise, n.10 followed and drifted to her left. aha!, i thought. i started darting to the left, and then to the right, and then to the left again continuously... and n.10 kept mirroring me. this all happened while we were waiting for the feed-in. it felt as though we were playing catching. i had an impish smile on my face, i found it so comical (though n.10 probably didn't realise it).

after a few scrums though, n.10 realised that we were not able to win most of the scrums, even if they were our feed-ins. so she stopped marking me completely.

overall, even though we lost, it was a good experience. at least we worked loads on our defence. and we got to play a tough match.

that's enough about rugby, i shall stop now.

.

london feels like home now.
i guess jx once summed it up when he said, "home is where my two feet are."