Part 2 Behind Closed Doors - Wednesdays Underground

In our Part 2 on Behind Closed Doors, we bring you through our Wednesdays trainings. Trainings are scheduled to be at 7pm, but by the time every one waltzes in and does their usual shenanigans, we end up starting at 7.30pm. One thing we never mention about the SMUrugby team is that the whole team is in a different time zone. The team which is well known to be poor with punctuality, functions with a +30minutes or more to all schedule times.

What do we mean?

To elaborate here are a few examples and scenarios.

1. If the Captain wanted to start training at 7.30pm, he would have to tell his team that training starts at 7.00pm.

2. If the Captain wanted to start warm up on game time at 4pm. He would have to tell his team to come down at 2.30pm to give time for +30 minutes buffer and for an hour for the boys to change, prepare the water and get taped up.

3. If the Captain keeps pulling off this +30 minutes buffer stunt, the team gets a bit smart and will take matters into their own hands and the resulting rationale is as follow

Step 1 – Reads Email
Captain says in email that training is at 7pm.

Step 2 – Typical SMU rugby player
If Captain say 7pm….means 7.30pm “ok lah…still got time to ‘go take 5’(smoke) and see some up skirts at ‘Pick and Bite’(one of the school’s eatery)

Step 3 – The Slippery Slope and Pluralistic Ignorance
Since every one will probably think the same way as I do…and they will probably only start REACHING the training venue around 7.30pm, I think I will just make sure I reach there by 8pm.

Do you see how this can turn into quite a nightmare?

So Wednesday nights, we usually train at a public compound/walkway/corridor in SMU, as the School Sports hall is fully booked on that day. The place where we train is located underground at SMU and surrounded by retail shops, clinics and some banks. It is the best possible open space we have to train on that is convenient for every one who has classes till 6.45pm and that has lights and a decent space to work conduct training.

The space is usually too tight to work with a 30 man rugby team, as we have to deal with running in between passer bys or hoping that whoever kicked that ball (even though told not to) does not chop off the head of the innocent old lady withdrawing money at the ATM. Not to mention, sometimes the school cheerleaders, insist on fighting with us for the limited space while we train, but I guess we don’t mind it all that much. Therefore with the space that we have, Wednesdays' sessions are usually spent doing our basic skills and unit skills. Team-run is certainly a no-no.

Nevertheless, despite the constraints the team still showed a fair bit of commitment and turn up for training on Wednesdays.

Hmm but maybe...it was more for the cheerleaders.