BARI - captains log, stardate: day1

slovenian men drew 2-2 with spanish men in a close game...

chief ref binned the slovenians twice for one of their players bobbing his head under the water to watch the game while in the subs bench. i dunno, is it in the rules that they have to have their heads up? its bad enough that they arent allowed to interchange after goals and have to wait for players to sub out, but even if the ruling was correct, geez it's anal in the extreme isn't it? surely it should be changed if thats the rule.

france men played belgium, score was 4-0 at halftime but blew out a bit more in the end, very strong start to the game from belgium in the opening minutes i thought, and they had some good strong passages of play.

turkey men also played italy this avo and won 9-0 (i think) ...the game was a very strange due to the fact that there were no hugely contentious or blatantly wrong refs calls or timekeepers stuff-ups or organisers boo-hoos.

they were playing national anthems in the uwr today, i dont know what it means... and one of the turkish uwr guys had some guy knee him in the chest and break his ribs. nice.

tomorrow is the start of seeding and playoff games for the mens grade, not sure exactly who is what seed yet... women still have a few rr games to play i think. following day must be finals i guess.

__________________
it's more polite on the grating than on the subs bench

You know Liam, as a coach you might want to read up on the rules a bit. Players should know them too, but as a coach...

Good Luck in the Playoffs, hold France to 3 and take the moral victory

Duck

__________________
Just in case you weren't sure, it's official -- CMAS sucks.
Oh yeah, and now they're broke.

when duck starts spouting rules knowingly, you guys are in trouble! :>))) By current rules: the bobbing head would be legal only IF there is a neutral zone (where the Romulians live) between the sub box and playing area. Then bobbing heads are not in playing area. If bobbing head IS in playing area, this is illegal. As the deck ref (and I am), I would warn once, then penalize. BTW, when I warn one team, I try/want to warn other team too. Keep everyone on same page.

I realize it is minor, but as deck ref trying to determine legal subbing, having any part of a sub player in the playing are creates confusion - is player entering or not? It is amazing how many players, coaches, etc are not conversant with rules and spend a lot of time arguing - uselessly and wasting play time - about something they know little about! Either read up on rules or trust the deck ref to know them - that is my job - know the rules. I also realize/have read that there in Bari your refs are not the best. This is when it is critical for a coach and/or team cpt to know the rules.

__________________
Carol Rose

the 'open or free subbing' system used in Sheffield was for Sheffield only. BUT everyone liked it. It was also used in NZ for So Hemispheres, and we used it at USOA nationals - both with great success and enthusiasm. With side subbing, it is much speedier and efficient system. I would strongly suggest someone put in an official rule change for 2008 for at least side deck subbing. If someone put in change now, we mite be able to get it done before 2008 and have in place for Durban????????? hmmmmmmm

__________________
Carol Rose

Looks like seeds should be
1 France
2 Spain
3 Turkey
4 Slovenia (I think even if they beat spain they'd be 4th due to the head to head loss to Turkey)
5 Belgium
6 Italy

Will the 2 vs. 3 game be tomorrow afternoon? Would love a detail posting of the semis and final.

__________________
An aquifer is a water bearing layer of rock or soil. Aquifers are separated by impermeable layers of rock or clay called an aquitard. Aquitard, however may sound a bit offensive to some, and therefore we will be changing the name to Aquachallenge.

im not talking about bobbing heads in the playing area carol i just mean in the subs zone....

duck, its not that easy to remember WHICH rules were instigated in which given year and therefore WHICH set they are using as they are ignoring the last set of amendments... but who cares. my attention to the rules has lapsed here i must admit since none of them are really being followed anyway.

tomorrow is seedings games, 1 vs 6, 2 vs 5, 3 vs 4.

winners take the top seed spot from the game, then the 5-6 playoff in the evening. the following day, semis in the morning and playoffs in the afternoon.

women have their final rr games tomorrow, then the following day semis in the morning and playoffs in the afternoon.

apparently they would have been playing the free subbing thing after goals BUT laurent the french guy argued that the french have stopped using it because at tourneys they believed it gave an unfair advantage to one team over the other in that their coach got to talk to them more than the other team... personally i think he was spouting rubbish and i dont know why anyone paid him any attention. but anyway.

3rd-4th between slovenia and turkey is a must-win for whoever it is to avoid 4th spot and the semi against france. i have tried to get official confirmation of the seedings and game schedule but to no avail here at the dorm, i cant even get a phone number of someone who will know, so i just figured it out myself, got the same results as tuck so i hope i'm right, and we'll see tomorrow if they've made the mightiest cock-up in history and seeded france 5th or something.

__________________
it's more polite on the grating than on the subs bench

go on spain

well done lads,im delighted for them,they have done a few high altitude training camps over the last few months and put the hard work in.
i believe they are being coached by a dutch player.

also they have been logging on to this site a lot and taking notes meticulously and practising them in the pool.
and of course going to every tournament they can.

just shows what a bit of effort and focus can do in a relatively short period.

Hasta victoria siempre !

__________________
top of de mornin to yeh

they certainly have improved a bit. though i can't say i like their idea of tactics... the ugliest "slam it on the wall and bash" rubbish i've seen in a long time.

but you've gotta start somewhere.

__________________
it's more polite on the grating than on the subs bench

Aren't we supposed to get the revised version with the last changes in it before we go on and make more changes?

__________________
Just in case you weren't sure, it's official -- CMAS sucks.
Oh yeah, and now they're broke.

and apologies to spain just as i diss them for playing a wall game they played pretty well running into the middle today as well, they had a really hard match against belgium. more credit to them for seemingly having the ability to play a closed game and also trying an open one! was a harsh game for the belgians, this was the playoff for 2nd seed between 2nd and 5th. they were so close but a contentious refs subbing call turned the tables on them early in the second half and they never quite recovered, belgians scored first in the first half, think it was tied at 1-1 for a while then spain went 1 up then 2 i think it ended 3-1? very close game.

i have to say i'm impressed with the way all the teams here have been improving throughout the comp, the level of play now is far higher than at the start of the tourney in my opinion.

at lunch there was a coaches game against the french men... coinciding with guillames birthday! consensus is the coaches won by 3-4 goals but score must have been 8-5 or so then cos we leaked a few goals too... but we only had 7 men against their 10 so it was a tough game to play. benson scored a couple of breakaways and finished a nice goal off the strike to reinforce his position as official monster in french uwh nightmares. also in that game was eryl adams the belgian womens coach, francois the belgian captain, jacques the french mens coach, guillame the belgian coach, me the turkish trainer and loic one of the frenchies.

french women played turkish women in the morning, won 9-0, tough game for the turks though they battled valiantly... france played italy in the 1st vs 6th seed playoff and i didnt catch the score or the game but i gather they won as the earth is still orbiting around the sun... (seems to be anyway)

french women then played the spanish, won 12-0... day at the office for them. turkish women played belgium and won... 11-0 or so? 12? unbelieveably i'm too stupid to remember the scores of my own teams. likewise i can't remember the turkey men vs slovenia score but think it was around 6-1, was a hard game, playoff between the 3rd and 4th seeds in a desperate battle to avoid the dreaded 1st vs 4th semi-final have have to play france in the knockouts... just checked the scores and actuallyi am positive it was 6-1 but the card says 5-1, i think they mucked it up... italy went down to france 11-0 in the end (turkey beat them 9-0... today they had jacques the coach sitting out actually coaching, while when the turks played france and went down 6-1 he was in the water playing and they sat out a couple of newbies)

refs not too impressive today setting a penalty shot in the womens grade 6m from the goal... luckily some coach or other i wont name kept up such a clamour about it they did actually check with the chief ref and reset it properly before it was taken. big problems with blatant gloving on the walls going uncalled in numerous games but the refs are just doing their best and they do call what they do manage to see.

last day tomorrow.

__________________
it's more polite on the grating than on the subs bench