Personal comment

Morning guys,

I am using the blog rather than text as the following is pretty lengthy and should be of interest to all members.

Brief –
I had a message on Monday afternoon inviting to me to a meeting that evening to talk through a concern the club had about the numbers of guest players that were turning up on a Saturday afternoon unnanounced and whose quality, in terms of footballing skills, might not be great. Unfortunately I was unable to attend the meeting but commented that I would support the majority decision. I will still support that decision but feel very nervous about the direction the club is now going.

Decision –
A guest player can only join if invited by a member and has to come with that member being introduced to the team; there first game is free. A members list will be placed at the guardhouse with only those players names appearing able to play; any guest will have to enter with a member.

Personal Comment –
The above decision does not tackle the question on lack of footballing skills; a member can still invite a player that might not have the ability that some of our members are looking for; what are we going to do in this case? Is the member going to be accountable and responsible for introducing only players with acceptable skills? How will that decision be reached? Who is going to marshal this?
Personally I think we are getting in to ‘murky waters’; since when have we become an elitist group of players? I still believe and will always believe we can have a club that caters for both talented and less talented players. If we are getting the better players disgruntled because of the quality of the game let’s look at running with 2 small pitches across field let’s not look at ways to discourage players joining. By the way; who will choose who those better players are? Many times I have been frustrated by my own play and know I don’t have the same skills as some others…. but am I included because of my service (in years) to the club?

Having a list on the gate will come with its own problems, just as it did at the Timex field. You need somebody who will regularly update the list and ensure the guards are working with the latest updates. Having guests only turning up with members will mean some advance planning. I recently introduced Mark to the club but knew it was not practical to meet him in advance of the game; we thus met at the field. Now I could have got someone else to meet up with him before the game but honestly didn’t want to piss about with that process. By the way; how are we going to treat the Koreans that are not members? Are they included/excluded from the list? Some of these players have questionable skills.
We actively promote our team on the web, we take opportunities to promote the club in the paper and talk to people we meet in the everyday life plus whatever other opportunities arise so we are always going to have the potential for people turning-up unannounced or with dubious skills. Do we really want to discourage those people? What happens if one of those people happens to be pretty decent? Is it not easier for the members within XP Cebu to take the initiative and start up a conversation with those new uninvited guest players and start asking questions? What’s happened with the power of verbal communication?

OK, now the problem with everything is that it needs people to get involved; it needs people to stop putting their own personal frustrations first and think about where the club is going. If we want an elitist group of players that have great footballing skills then fine; has that decision been taken already because I am not sure it has; or are we a club open to all that will look at ways of keeping everybody involved and not introduce hurdles to climb?

Now I think we could do a few things. Xavier and the training pre-game at 4.00pm is actually a really good idea even though I know many of the members don’t feel the necessity to join. We could use this as a tool for developing those guest players whose skills are not so well rounded and a way of identifying stronger players. We could move away from the full size pitch (which I personally enjoy) and go to 2 x smaller pitches; here you could mix the stronger players with a minority of weaker players whose games need developing.

Of course all this is dependent on people willing to take the mantle and organize which is something that has always been a problem with far too many ‘vocal’ rather than ‘active’ (inflammatory I know).

Maybe the first question we need to ask ourselves is ‘What type of club do we want to be? Do we want to be inclusive or exclusive?’. The question of local players has already been asked with some sought of muddled decision reached. After we have the answer to that question maybe then the decision on players becomes easier.

All the above is my own personal thoughts; a decision has already been reached but my concern to the welfare of the club led me to capturing the above concerns. If we are all happy with the decision then no further action required.