It’s been 149 days since leaving New Zealand and 103 days since arriving in the Netherlands. After settling into life in Nijeveen, being welcomed by the club and spending those 103 days learning Korfball the ‘DOS way’ through the first half of the outdoor competition, it was time for the more serious indoor competition to begin. This season will be an important one for DOS ’46 with A1 backing up from their second placing in the national league while the first team are seeking promotion back to the korfball league after falling at the final furlong in their last bid.
As detailed in my last post, home game weekends for DOS are big with the majority of top junior and senior teams playing one after the other. Today many teams played against SCO, a rival club from Wolwega. I arrived around 2pm to begin my medical duties for A1. It’s been a privilege to be able to perform such a roll and give back to the club that continues to provide so many opportunities and so much support for myself. One of those opportunities was to act as physio for the Noord Under 19 team at a recent district tournament where I was able to watch all the top Dutch junior players ply their trade.
Anyway, back to game day at De Eendracht. As you enter the sport hall, above the door are flames emblazoned with De Hel Van Nijeveen (The Hell Of Nijeveen), intimidating visiting teams entering the De Eendracht cauldron. The hall had been attired with sponsors billboards everywhere, seating was waiting to occupied, the canteen was primed with beer for all the punters and the wall of the sport hall was covered with a giant red and black banner with ‘You Never Walk Alone, Eendracht Maakt Macht (Eendracht Makes Power)’ in bold lettering. The usual pre-game strapping duties completed and A2 having a tough fought loss to SCO A1, DOS ’46 A1 took to playing surface against KZ/Hiltex A1. The support from the DOS community was evident with many more seats occupied in support of A1, including a number of supporters from KZ/Hiltex. An injury hit DOS ’46 battled well against KZ right from the start of the game, the score line see-sawing back and forth. Fortunately I managed to enjoy the game from the sideline as DOS ’46 managed to not sustain more injuries. However, KZ proved slightly more clinical throughout the game, managing to ease away in the second half to a 17-20 victory. This was followed by DOS ’46 3 loosing a tight match to DeetosSnel 2 17-19.
The energy and crowd numbers in the hall began to slowly build as the A-selection took to the court. First up was DOS ’46 2 vs. SCO 2. Early on it became clear that the Dossers would have too much skill for the opponents, clearing out for an easy 27-15 victory. For this Kiwi alien at DOS ’46 it was just as fascinating watching the transformation of the hall in anticipation of the first team’s match as it was watching the seconds teams emphatic victory. Every seat became occupied, the drinks cart was set up to serve beverages to seated spectators, standing room in the raised surround of the court was minimal, especially at the home end of the court where the Griftaside (DOS ’46 supporters club, consisting mostly of players) had set up residence. Even Koru the Korfball Kiwi could be spotted in the crowd if you looked hard enough. Somewhere between 500-600 spectators crammed in, showing the support DOS ’46 receives in Nijeveen. I am told when DOS ’46 was at the top of the Korfball League from 2006-2009 up to 1500 spectators turned up for home games. The there were glossy printed programmes being clutched by many spectators, junior players with their DOS ’46 player books and pens in hand hunting for autographs, not to mention the TV camera from the local station doing pre-game interviews with the players. As a sport, some Dutch people say Korfball doesn’t rank highly on the importance scale in society and while nothing here comes close to Football as a sport of social impact, the passion for Korfball at DOS ’46 is clear.
The first team followed the lead of the second team, demonstrating their obviously superior skill level to establish an early lead that only became wider and wider as the game progressed. The crowd support was epic, the emotions riding on every call and play was obvious as the cheers and sighs were as loud as each other. Chants from the Griftaside also regularly added to the volume levels filling De Eendracht. As with all sport, the crowd also knows the rules better than the schiedscrechter (referee) right??!! Certainly here it is no different with the referee receiving plenty of ‘advice’ from the crowd, particularly the older men. DOS ’46 1 managed to outdo the effort of their second team counterparts, winning 27-14 in a strong first step on the road back to the Korfball league.
As the children swamped the players for autographs, the signage packed away and the vast crowd either filtered home or to the canteen for a beer, our forth team took to the court for our 9.15pm game. As this report is already quite long I won’t get into too many details about our game. Coops was still away in France and I was spending time getting splinters on the bench due to a niggly Achilles that has limited me in the last few weeks. We enjoyed some rowdy support from the few from the crowd that remained, some of whom no doubt had a few beers in them as well! ASVD 2 scored some early goals but DOS ’46 4 had the control of the game, particularly around the hoop. The game stayed quite even throughout although ASVD managed to keep their noses just in front with some good long shots. I jumped on court to some big cheers from fellow club members for the last 10 minutes of the game but ASVD 2 quickly scored some more long shots to finish of a 15-19 win. The team was obviously disappointed to throw away a game we should have won. There is certainly the skill level and shooting ability within the team to be very successful, we just need to improve our combinations on court. For me it is about continuing the learning process. I am finding that I know what I should be doing on court, unfortunately I have been realising immediately after the play rather than during it! This will improve with more experience on court and as pattern recognition improves. That seems to be the major difference right now, recognising the next action required in the sequence on court. This is something that appears ingrained and automatic to the Dutch korfballers with much more experience in the game.
Tot volgende week
Lorenzo
As detailed in my last post, home game weekends for DOS are big with the majority of top junior and senior teams playing one after the other. Today many teams played against SCO, a rival club from Wolwega. I arrived around 2pm to begin my medical duties for A1. It’s been a privilege to be able to perform such a roll and give back to the club that continues to provide so many opportunities and so much support for myself. One of those opportunities was to act as physio for the Noord Under 19 team at a recent district tournament where I was able to watch all the top Dutch junior players ply their trade.
Anyway, back to game day at De Eendracht. As you enter the sport hall, above the door are flames emblazoned with De Hel Van Nijeveen (The Hell Of Nijeveen), intimidating visiting teams entering the De Eendracht cauldron. The hall had been attired with sponsors billboards everywhere, seating was waiting to occupied, the canteen was primed with beer for all the punters and the wall of the sport hall was covered with a giant red and black banner with ‘You Never Walk Alone, Eendracht Maakt Macht (Eendracht Makes Power)’ in bold lettering. The usual pre-game strapping duties completed and A2 having a tough fought loss to SCO A1, DOS ’46 A1 took to playing surface against KZ/Hiltex A1. The support from the DOS community was evident with many more seats occupied in support of A1, including a number of supporters from KZ/Hiltex. An injury hit DOS ’46 battled well against KZ right from the start of the game, the score line see-sawing back and forth. Fortunately I managed to enjoy the game from the sideline as DOS ’46 managed to not sustain more injuries. However, KZ proved slightly more clinical throughout the game, managing to ease away in the second half to a 17-20 victory. This was followed by DOS ’46 3 loosing a tight match to DeetosSnel 2 17-19.
The energy and crowd numbers in the hall began to slowly build as the A-selection took to the court. First up was DOS ’46 2 vs. SCO 2. Early on it became clear that the Dossers would have too much skill for the opponents, clearing out for an easy 27-15 victory. For this Kiwi alien at DOS ’46 it was just as fascinating watching the transformation of the hall in anticipation of the first team’s match as it was watching the seconds teams emphatic victory. Every seat became occupied, the drinks cart was set up to serve beverages to seated spectators, standing room in the raised surround of the court was minimal, especially at the home end of the court where the Griftaside (DOS ’46 supporters club, consisting mostly of players) had set up residence. Even Koru the Korfball Kiwi could be spotted in the crowd if you looked hard enough. Somewhere between 500-600 spectators crammed in, showing the support DOS ’46 receives in Nijeveen. I am told when DOS ’46 was at the top of the Korfball League from 2006-2009 up to 1500 spectators turned up for home games. The there were glossy printed programmes being clutched by many spectators, junior players with their DOS ’46 player books and pens in hand hunting for autographs, not to mention the TV camera from the local station doing pre-game interviews with the players. As a sport, some Dutch people say Korfball doesn’t rank highly on the importance scale in society and while nothing here comes close to Football as a sport of social impact, the passion for Korfball at DOS ’46 is clear.
The first team followed the lead of the second team, demonstrating their obviously superior skill level to establish an early lead that only became wider and wider as the game progressed. The crowd support was epic, the emotions riding on every call and play was obvious as the cheers and sighs were as loud as each other. Chants from the Griftaside also regularly added to the volume levels filling De Eendracht. As with all sport, the crowd also knows the rules better than the schiedscrechter (referee) right??!! Certainly here it is no different with the referee receiving plenty of ‘advice’ from the crowd, particularly the older men. DOS ’46 1 managed to outdo the effort of their second team counterparts, winning 27-14 in a strong first step on the road back to the Korfball league.
As the children swamped the players for autographs, the signage packed away and the vast crowd either filtered home or to the canteen for a beer, our forth team took to the court for our 9.15pm game. As this report is already quite long I won’t get into too many details about our game. Coops was still away in France and I was spending time getting splinters on the bench due to a niggly Achilles that has limited me in the last few weeks. We enjoyed some rowdy support from the few from the crowd that remained, some of whom no doubt had a few beers in them as well! ASVD 2 scored some early goals but DOS ’46 4 had the control of the game, particularly around the hoop. The game stayed quite even throughout although ASVD managed to keep their noses just in front with some good long shots. I jumped on court to some big cheers from fellow club members for the last 10 minutes of the game but ASVD 2 quickly scored some more long shots to finish of a 15-19 win. The team was obviously disappointed to throw away a game we should have won. There is certainly the skill level and shooting ability within the team to be very successful, we just need to improve our combinations on court. For me it is about continuing the learning process. I am finding that I know what I should be doing on court, unfortunately I have been realising immediately after the play rather than during it! This will improve with more experience on court and as pattern recognition improves. That seems to be the major difference right now, recognising the next action required in the sequence on court. This is something that appears ingrained and automatic to the Dutch korfballers with much more experience in the game.
Tot volgende week
Lorenzo