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Saturday, October 11th 2003. Tianma soccer pitch.
There was a bit of unknown when this game started. For their second game, Les Bleus' opposition was the Latin team, who participate in the SIFL for the first time. Although the French side did win against them in the tournament, the Latin's had reinforced themselves. Les Bleus also had a different team than their first game against Japan.
The game started slowly, the ball being mainly controlled by both sides in the midfield. In the first ten minutes, Les Bleus seemed to take a good start. Two shots from Benjamin G. slightly missed their targets, Damien infiltrated the right flank but the defender came back quickly to avoid a good cross. But little by little, Latin's got into the game. The first warning was a free kick on their right side, two players went over the ball before Eduardo could finally take it. Minutes later, Latin's came for another attack. Their first shot was denied by Eduardo again, who came back to stop the second one... but unhappily, there was a third who went in. 1-0 Latin's. The remaining half was quite poor. None of the teams could really take a hold on the ball. The score didn't move.
In the first minutes of the second half, the Latin's pushed again. They gained a free kick on the edge of the box. A nice shot went over the wall and finished in the net. Down to 2-0, Les Bleus tried to come back in the game, but they looked disorganised and unable to move the ball near the opposite goal. Another quick counter from Latin's and Bernard moved the ball away with his hand: a free kick in a similar position as the previous one, and a red card for Bernard. The same shooter, the same result! 3-0, tough times again. Playing with ten seemed to give the French team a little more spirit. They got some opportunities and Amer scored a penalty. Unhappily, soon after, a counter-attack give Latin's another opportunity they didn't miss... A last effort from Les Bleus gave them a 2nd goal (Amer), but that was too late.
Comments: "We did not play well, Latin's deserved to win. We were late on the ball, and couldn't get it moving. Now we have two weeks to work for our upcoming game against Shooters. And there is some work to do for sure!"
Next Game: Saturday, October 25th, Les Bleus - Shooters.
During the past weeks, one question has been wandering around in the team "Les Bleus". Where the hell is Max? As we questionned him, he just had some strange answers about some factories, garden dwarves, wheelbarrows, going around China... No need to say that it puzzled our dauntless reporter (that's me!), who took his camera, disguised himself, and investigated into the mistery! And here are more exclusive revelations!! (Warning, some pictures may be shocking, but it is our duty as reporter to report the true facts....) In fact, Maxime has been taking big risks for our team! Yes, unhappy by the Big Bamboo Voodoo insolent message "and of course continue beating the French!" on their web site, he's been putting himself in great danger to learn the new secrets of that team. And he found it. Those malicious Voodoos have created a band, and they play at full moon to curse the other teams. But thanks to our intrepid Max who followed them with his wheelbarrow (doesn't he look intrepid on the picture?), we have unmasked their plot: look at the exclusive picture he took from their last Voodoo session! Thank you, Max!
Saturday, September 20th 2003. Tianma soccer pitch.
The first game of the official season kicked off at 11:00am, Shanghai time. Les Bleus had good positionning in the first minutes, allowing them to control the ball most of the time. This domination was soon rewarded by the first goal of the season. On a shooting opportunity, a Japanese defender had no other choice but to stop the ball with his hand on the line. Penalty logically granted by the referee, even if we could wonder why the defender was not shown the red card... Damien scored. Several minutes later, the same Damien dribbled his way into the box, and was brought down. A second penalty whistled, and Damien scored again! 2-0 at half-time, a good start.When the team came back on the pitch, it was a different game. Five players were changed on the french side. Organization went down, and the Japanese, as always back with spirit, took control of the game. It did not take time before they changed the face of the game. One, two, three goals went in... Les Bleus team was changed again, and tried to reverse the score again. Japanese even scored a fourth one. Final score: 4-2.Coach comments: "We played great football in first half. But our mistake was to think the game was won at half time. And I shouldn't have made so many changes at that point. I take my responsibilities, it was a mistake. But we learn from mistake, and there are hopes according to the way we played in the first half. Congratulations to the Japanese for their great spirit!"
Next Game: Saturday, October 11th, Les Bleus - Latins.
STATISTICS
1 - THE GOODS (Goalscorers)
| Player | Goals |
| Olivier C. | 5 |
| Jerome | 3 |
| Damien D. | 3 |
| David Y. | 3 |
| David 0. | 3 |
| Amer F. | 2 |
| Oumarou | 2 |
| Gregory V. | 2 |
2 - THE BADS (Cards)
| Player | Yellow | Red |
| David O. | 3 | 0 |
| Bernard P. | 0 | 1 |
| Benjamin G. | 2 | 0 |
| Oumarou | 2 | 0 |
| Sebastien R. | 1 | 0 |
| Gregory V. | 1 | 0 |
| Eduardo | 1 | 0 |
| Christophe C. | 1 | 0 |
| Xavier T. | 1 | 0 |
| Michel M. | 1 | 0 |
| Santiago | 1 | 0 |
3 - THE WONDERFULS (Man of the Match)
| Player | Nominations |
| Damien D. | 3 |
| Adrien C. | 2 |
| Amer F. | 1 |
| Willy H. | 1 |
| Olivier C. | 1 |
| Xavier T. | 1 |
Au mépris de sa vie étant donné le service d'ordre impressionnant qui l'entoure, notre reporter toujours aussi vaillant a réussi à approcher le Président des Bleus pour sa première interview depuis sa prise de pouvoir (toute tentative d'association avec le mot "putsch" est de l'entière responsabilité du lecteur, l'auteur ne cherchant à induire aucune interprétation déviante, z'avez qu'à voir les tronches du service d'ordre tiens...). Confidences!
Andrzej, vous êtes un homme occupé, merci de répondre à ces quelques questions!
Q: Andrzej, président des Bleus: un rêve de gamin qui se réalise?
Déjà tout petit on me surnomme président, c'est une étiquette qui est restée collée à mes baskets toute ma vie. Mais aujourd'hui je suis au sommet de la pyramide, sans que cela m'empêche de voir le bout pointu.
Q: Selon nos sources, joueurs et dirigeants vous surnomment "Le cerveau". Pourquoi d’après vous?
Oh, vous savez, c'est assez simple, j'ai la tête qui penche dangereusement d'un côté. Mais je vous assure je n'ai braqué aucun train. (NDA: rires retenus du service d'ordre...)
Q: Gros recrutement cette saison, un nouvel entraîneur, des décisions fortes... Ne craignez vous pas l'échec?
L'échec fait partie de notre vie, et de la mienne aussi, surtout depuis que j'ai rejoins l'équipe des Bleus. Mais nous sommes au creux de la vague, nous étions avant-derniers, nous pouvons faire encore mieux cette année.
Q: Finalement, vodka ou bière?
Je vous dirais franchement : les deux. C'est simple, dans mon pays on les marie de manière singulière, sur un grand verre plein de bière, on pose un mouchoir en tissu, on le tend au-dessus du verre et avec un doigt on l'enfonce pour que le milieu du mouchoir touche la bière. A partir de là on verse doucement la vodka sur les parois du mouchoir afin qu'elle reste à la surface de la bière. Une boisson ainsi préparée se boit vite, bien et l'effet est garanti au bout d'un seul verre.
Merci encore Andrzej. Et rappelons que tous les joueurs sont (fortement) invités à venir faire le "test du mouchoir" au Smokies Samedi 13 Septembre.
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