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Thursday, September 21, 2006

NZ TEAMS to SINGAPORE

 

This is a permanent record of a MPC Blog posting

I was fortunate enough to travel to Singapore to watch our teams in action at the recent Singapore International Tournament. It was great to stand on the sidelines and cheer our teams on but it was very clear that we were the "country bumkins" in terms of support.

 

New Zealand was the only country attending that did not have a coach or a manager. They were left completely to their own devices. The teams did not know the format of the tournament until the day after they arrived in Singapore. They were supposed to be met at Singapore Airport on arrival, but weren't, and had to find their own way to the hotel. See also complaint about no manager.

 

The teams were not compatible. You can tell when a team is together, in sync, and confident with each other. This was not the case with our two teams in Singapore. This is no reflection whatsoever on individual players or ability. All of them are top players in NZ. But, they should not have been playing together in an international team and I believe PNZ did them an injustice puting them together in the first place and sending them off with no support was unfair.

 

They did not look comfortable playing together. There was no one to advise, help or encourage them. PNZ had arranged one weekend in Napier for them to practice which is ridiculous. These people had never played together before. They should have had three or four hard training weekends and been allowed to go to Singapore earlier to adjust to conditions.

 

The temperatures were in the high 30's and with very high humidity, there was nowhere to escape the incredible heat. The world teams heads off with managers, coaches, tournaments organised for practice and plenty of time to adjust to conditions. I also wonder why we had a women's team and a mens' team when the other countries had mixed teams. I hope next year, if we are invited back, more thought is put into team selection, compatibility and training.

-Graeme Burnard

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2 Comments:

 

At 3:54 PM, Anonymous said...

I would like to respond to Graeme's article about the recent Singapore tournament. Graeme's observations of the two teams were that they were not compatible, in sync or confident with each other. Whilst I respect and understand his view, I would like to ask Graeme if he also observed the efforts made and resilience shown by team members in an attempt to overcome these issues, which in my view were testament to our overall achievement at this event.

 

As a NZ representative competing in this event, I really appreciated the sideline support from both Graeme and Joan and my tournament report (to be published in the next PNZ magazine) concurs with Graeme's view of the need for a Manager to support teams in any international tournament.

-Joanne Lippard

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At 9:25 AM, Anonymous said...

Joanne is quite correct. There was a lot of effort made by team members to " be a team" and I regret that I did not emphasise that in my initial letter. My argument is, that they should not have had to do that, during a tournament. It is my ongoing criticism of how PNZ is run and how small groups contuinue to be favoured. I hope I did not casue offence to any team members. PNZ need to be taken to task over how this event was organised from NZ. They have been sending teams away long enough now to "get it right"

-Graeme Burnard

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At 10:08 AM, Tom van Bodegraven said...

As much as I admire the resilience of the the NZ representatives in Singapore, I agree with Graeme. Our teams should start from a position of strength. It is difficult enough to perform at this high international level without having to make "an attempt to overcome these issues". It all comes back to our unsuitable selection possess.

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