Football and writing poetries, I have always prioritized the most. Here football tournament itself is knocking at my gate, how could I not welcome it. Wearing the captain band, it became my responsibility to give my best. Each morning started with the practice and usually continued till evening because the classes in between we attended was of no value as we even sitting in those classes, used to discuss our strategy. Days passed with a high acceleration and we stepped in the stadium. A lot of supporters were present there, but my insane eyes were searching for those two eyes, whom I cherished most and the search finally ended with dissatisfaction. I was excited to play at first, but now it has been hammered down by a certain percentage. The match started with a whistle and all the eleven started giving their best. It was a knock out match and hence our win was much needed. Playing with full power, exhausted us within the starting twenty minutes, whereas the opponent team was saving their energy for the second half. Heard a lot about them for their witty strategies, but now there was no sign of their wittiness. After struggling for a while, I took a shoot by dribbling three defenders and even the goalkeeper all by myself, however my overconfidence ruined my golden chance. Taking the ball from goalkeeper I was sure that it would be goal if I push the ball slightly to the target, but I was not aware that a defender was running, crossing his own limits. He ran very fast and when the ball was few centimeters away from entering the post, he made to reach there and cleared the ball. All of the people with high hopes were shocked as they all were sure of it to enter the goal post. The clearance was followed by a half time whistle and when I reached out, the coach did patted my back, but also all of them had a common line, "I wish he was just two seconds late or you'd have kicked it in with a little more strength" Missing a goal did affected my confidence, but being a captain, I couldn't show others my feelings and rather just smiled and said, we reached their post on this half and will enter their post on other half" My line motivated them. I shared them my plan to proceed, but our coach, who was proud of himself declined it and presented a new plan. Since the plan was new and made fast, players were not able to grasp it and hence on the start of the second half, all followed my directions. Within the first five minutes, I assisted to the center forward and he scored a goal. Though I failed to score one, I assisted one and it made my confidence restore. I directed all to start defending from now, but our coach was not ready. He screamed from outside to follow his plan and continue attacking. He permitted only three defenders to stay back, two on midfield and asked rest all to attack. We all were understanding that it's a wrong decision, but we had no choice. We followed him and after a few minutes only, opponent team scored a goal. The equalizer goal made a great impact on our mindsets and also shown green flag to our coach sir. He screamed, "I was saying you from starting to attack as much as possible. Now go attack as much as you can" We had no choice left and started attacking, however, they were all ready with their defenders and hence started defending. We were out of energy as was giving our full efforts from the beginning, but they saved their energy which made their attacks more impactful, which resulted in back to back goals. The final whistle was blown by the referee and score board highlighted 3-1. I understood why they were famous for witty strategies.
