The A team

It all started with a cheerful warning from a departing volunteer “good luck mate”, leaving me naively thinking ‘how hard can it be, they’re only children’

Until my arrival the children were deprived of sports lessons due to the past teacher deciding enough was enough and duly vanishing before my arrival. This created a perfect platform to start the GVI sports programme, as the children would be able to start enjoying their much-loved sports once again.

As the first sports volunteer working at Auxillium school I would need to use my vast (lack of) expertise to implement structure, organisation, law and order to a group of children who are prone to erupt into ecstatic rapture when hearing the two simple letters, P.T.

The first main obstacle was the sports field, which more closely resembled a marshy backwater scene rather than a primary school’s sports field. To make matters worse, this field also doubled as the schools rubbish dump as well as their burning site. Although burning rubbish did little to deter the players, who would literally walk through burning coals to get to the football first, this truly demonstrated how committed these boys were to their sports and further motivated me to clean up the field. Coach Angus joined me two weeks after my arrival and together we pushed hard to get the field cleared and in a “playable” state for the children.

This job was helped with some of the money raised from the charity bike ride (read the previous blog) that enabled us to hire gardeners and workers to remove the various rocks/logs as well as grass. Once they were “finished” we were left with a bumpy, rocky and waterlogged pitch. It quickly became evident that we had a lot of manual labour on our hands to truly finish what I had started 4 weeks ago!

As we get nearer to the end of the monsoon season and the sun came out more frequently each day, things were getting better, the arrival of another sports coach, coach Huw added even more with his skills and past experiences (and fresh enthusiasm for manual labour in the rapidly increasing heat) Meaning that a class of over 50 eager beaver students could get the coaching to develop skills, or at least three mouths to answer the seemingly never ending and repetitive questions, which I will excuse for over enthusiasm.

Within only a small amount of time with basic training the players were becoming noticeably better. Individual skill was always high but now they were playing as team members, especially the Manipur children who seem to have a sixth sense in knowing were other team members would be. With cross field balls and diving headers it’s easy to forgive coach Angus having a small weep from joy.

Alas, six weeks into the programme and there is still much work to do. However if the programme continues at its current pace don’t be surprised by a Keralan or Manipur team beating the likes of Arsenal or Liverpool sooner or later (probably sooner). We reckon they would already humiliate Chelsea…Banner may not be worth £50 million but he can sure score better (and more frequently) than his Chelsea counterpart.

The A team