Hi, Friends. Shall I tell you a joke in a single line? Here it goes –“I was made the captain of a football team”. Doesn’t it look like a joke, ones dearer to me can understand how big a joke it is.
Few years ago, when I was in college, it rained heavily on a day. I was returning from my college to hostel. I was stuck in the rain. I had no other option than to get a shade under a tree in the ground. That is the only incident when I have entered the ground. After that I have mostly refrained from entering the ground for any purpose.
Now I am back, this time, as a captain of a prestigious team. Background of the event goes like this. A football tournament is planned in our department. Six groups to participate in the tournament with two team each from a group. In our group, there are only few players who can play the game well. Others are just novices. In a motive to make one team from our group stronger, they put all the stronger players in one team and other amateurs in the other. Obviously I am the captain of the latter.
“What is our team strategy?” asked one of the eager guys from my team. I asked “can we play with 6 goalies?” He said no. Then the only way is to play with one goalie and five defenses. “What about forward?” he asked again. I know that ball will never go to the other half of the ground, so I don’t want my resources to get wasted by standing and bantering with the opponent goalie.
When our team was formed, they rattled off the name of the players. One of our colleagues asked me “not knowing football the only criterion for entering into your team?” I was not surprised by his question, because what his statement was vindicated when one of my team mates asked “should we hit the ball only with leg or can we also use head?”. I thought I was the worst.
Fortunately the other two team captains in my pool are my friends. So I am planning to clinch a deal with both of them, not to put more than 9 goals. Is 9 a magical number? No, I don’t want my team to get trounced by the opponents by putting a two digit number of goals. Hope the deal works. Any how two teams from a pool will move to the next stage and one team has to bid good bye. That one team in my pool is already decided. If there are close matches, all the three teams win one match each, and then the number of goals will come into picture for selecting the top two teams. I don’t want the tournament organizers to involve in so much complex calculations for selecting the top two in my pool. I want to make their job easy.
Now coming to the way I was selected as the captain. Only problem with my team is all the eight members are fighting for a place in substitutes where only two are allowed. Now did you get the reason why I accepted the role of captain? I will select the team and I will definitely reserve a place for me as substitute. If anyone asks why I am not playing, I can reply to them saying I want to give chances to young blood and test my bench strength, so that I can play my best team in the finals. If they know about my team in prior, sure to expect a haughty laugh from them, but I don’t mind.
Do you know what my team’s name is? It is “Football for Fun - FFF”. Yes for others fun and to be made fun of. Don’t misunderstand FFF for something else.
Sports is not my cup of tea, let alone football. It is not the cup of tea for my team mates either. We just want to participate and have some fun. We would be happy at least the other team from our group plays some good game; at least there is some use for our sacrifices. Do you want to know the sacrifices? Even if you don’t I will let you know. Initially two teams were formed with equal number of good players. Eventually to make one strong team, we exchanged our good players with their novices. I have no qualms about all these.
Looking ahead for the match to bring my leadership skills to the fore!
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