- Maverdee, EIKT 2012
Six players from Dundee Korfball Club took part in Edinburgh’s International Korfball Tournament last weekend, joining up with friends from Edinburgh Mavericks to form a combined “Maverdee” team. They performed really well in all 8 of their matches, and finished in 17th place out of 24.
Day One
The “Maverdee” team started strongly, earning 2-2 and 1-1 draws with Birmingham Bulls and Edinburgh University 2 on Saturday morning. The team then lost out to a last minute goal by Leeds University (final score 2-1), before being given a real lesson in how to play by two teams of old masters: the Dutch team Paal Centraal beat us by 6 goals to 2, and then a scratch team of of ex-University all-stars (Original Old Boys ’91) beat us by 3 goals to 1. All of the games were played in incredibly good spirits though, and as relative newcomers we were just as happy to learn as we were to win.
Day Two
Our opposition on the second day of the competition was more closely matched in both age and experience, and we went into the day with much higher hopes for some good results. We were not disappointed: eventually managing to beat all three of our remaining opponents in the slightly longer (than Saturday’s) games. We started the day with a comprehensive 5-2 win over Edinbugh University 4, and then a much tighter 3-2 win over Edinburgh University 3 (notable mainly for a none-too-subtle double substitution, with Nigel coming back on when Steven pulled a muscle). The hardest match of all was Maverdee’s final game though, a rematch of Saturdays tie with Leeds University. This time it was the Maverdonians who came out on top, just hanging on to win by one goal after Leeds came back strongly from 4-2 down with 5 minutes left to play.
Top scorer for Dundee was Mary, but there were also fine performances from Dayne (including his first competitive goal – a fine long shot to level the scores against Birmingham), Nigel, Caroline, Steven and Kim (playing in her first ever competitive games).
The tournament was eventually won by the “Mexican” team Los Mucherados, who bore an uncanny resemblance to a scratch team from Manchester and Nottingham (in England, I believe). Los Mucherados beat the Original Ruff Shakers (from Norwich) by 8 goals to 6 in a very high quality final game, with the Dutch team Paal Centraal eventually finishing in bronze medal position. (For anyone who doesn’t know, korfball was invented in Holland in 1902, and the Dutch have been world champions almost every year since then).
On behalf of Dundee Korfball Club, I would very much like to thank the Mavericks for putting up with us all weekend. We are also grateful for all the goals they scored at their end! 🙂