of football and running

 

I’ve always had the passion for football since I was a little boy, basically due to my brothers lah who have the same passion as well. Though I have never represented the state or country, but I think I was an excellent player then, ehem ehem.

I represented my school and played as the goalkeeper for the u15 and u18, though my preferred position was midfield. Guess there was too much competition back then and probably I didn’t have enough confidence during those years.

After leaving school, I played as a midfield in a few teams, controlling the tempo of the game, and dictating play by stringing passes. I do have the knack @ vision to see where I could make the passes ie through ball and changing side. Well, that’s how I see myself as a player lah.

But now as a teacher I do not get the opportunity to play as much as I like, except during practice session with the school football team, since I am the coach. I have been the coach since forever I think hahaa @ 23 years to be exact, and during those years, the team have been champion @ campeone six times, averaging once every four years.

As for running, I only realized I could run when I was in form five. Being among the rascals back then, we would always try to beat around the bush in almost all situations that were not to our liking. One day there was a cross country run at school, and together with some friends we decided we would fake injuries, so that we could stop along the way and not finish the run. But as it was, I found myself running at a steady pace and I came out at 10^th position. And because of that, it started my passion for running until today. My best run? Emm, in 1994, after practising for almost a month, I ran in the Terengganu Bridge Run @ half marathon. I targeted 30^th place because number one till thirty would get prize money, and since it was an international event where runners from all over the world took part, 30^th placing was a modest target. But alas, even though I ran my heart out, and my legs felt like jelly in the last 5km, I only managed 40^th placing, out of 1300 runners, in a time of 1 hour and 20+ minutes.

 

I still run, representing the education department at district, state and national level. My best achievement was coming out third in the national level 10km run held in Kedah in 2002, in a time of 45 minutes. And only a couple of weeks ago I took part in my final run for the district, which was held in Gopeng. It was a trail run, so the challenge was of a different level.

And this morning I ran with my school football players for 4km @ 21 minutes, and after a rest, played football with them for 35 minutes. It has been ages since I played football and I felt so good to be back playing. I managed to control the midfield and only had one misplaced pass. The game ended 1-1. But the thrill of playing again couldn’t be described in words.

Alhamdulillah is the best choice for now. And for ever, actually.