Jaguars succeeded in an international tournament

During the weekend 26th and 27th of September took place an international tournament Prague Powerchair Open 2015. Our team Jaguars participated as well as other seven teams – three of them were Czech – organisers New Cavaliers Prague, Red Dragons Prague and Indians Pilsen – and four teams were abroad – Magic Torino from Italy, Ruhr-Rollers from Germany, Trouble Makers from Slovenia and Zeka Rollers from Switzerland. The matches were played in the Sports hall Třebešín. It was a complicated situation for our team – as a last year winners we wanted to repeat the victory but we were obvious the difficulties we were facing – we were missing one player from a basic line-up, Pavel Štolba, and the second goalkeeper, Petra Černá, could play only one day. So we were only in five players – no substitution the whole tournament. It was a challenge even for Jan Hašlar, who still isn´t so well experienced. We could only hope that both material and players would make it.

We were going to play three matches in our group A on Saturday. The group A consisted of the stronger teams on this tournament, DSC_2374so it was clear that none of those matches were going to be easy. The first match convinced us of that right away. Our first opponent was the team Magic Torino from Italy. We had never played with this team before but right after the few first minutes it was clear that this team matches the Italian game – fast and tough. That match was really a no reminder of non-contact sport at all. We were lucky for a tie 2:2 at the end. And after the short rest there were another match – this time it was our biggest Czech opponent – New Cavaliers. He game was intense and equal as usual. The score was changing all the time for the benefit of both sides and we still weren´t able to take hold of our game and make the difference. Finally we won 7:6. After the lunch we played our last match against the team Trouble Makers. We managed to beat this team on the last year of this tournament for the first time in a long time. However each of our matches is always really equal. This time we lost 2:1.

The team Trouble Makers won our group A with two winnings. The team Magic Torino had the same score of points like our team – one win, one lost and one draw – but they had a better match results, so they were the second. We were the third and New Cavaliers the fourth. The group B was also really equal. The first was the team Zeka Rollers, the second were Indians, the third were Red Dragons and the fourth was the team Ruhr-Rollers. There was the first play-off match waiting for us on Saturday – with the second team from the group B – Indians. We experienced the first substitution of the whole tournament during this match – Petra went to the goal instead of me for the second half. And it was also the first match with the significant difference – we won 7:2.

We started with the semi-final match on Sunday – with the winner of the play-off match between the first from the group A with the fourth from the group B – and those were Trouble Makers again. This time around our couch chose another strategy and players´ positions – and it brought results right away. We managed to push the opponents to their half of the field and kept them there. Although it was really hard we made it and won 6:3. So we made it to the finale. Since New Cavaliers managed to win their semi-final match against Magic Torino too, New Cavaliers became our final opponent again – just like the last time. The playing time increased to 2×20 minutes and everyone knew it was going to be difficult. However we managed to keep the game during the first half and won it 3:0. But New Cavaliers improved in the second half and caught us. It was 5:5 and the end was coming. We scored fortunately and were able to keep it even though the opponents pressured us hard. We scored once again and won 7:5. And we were really happy and relieved because we defended our title.

So oDSC_2531n the eight place ended the team Ruhr-Rollers from Germany, the seventh were Red Dragons Prague, the sixth were SK Indians Pilsen, the fifth were Zeka Rollers, the fourth were Trouble Makers, the third Magic Torino, the second were New Cavaliers Prague and the tournament Prague Powerchair Open 2015 was won by Jaguars Prague again. The next success was an individual prize for the best player which went to Stanislav Cimpa from our team.

Thank to all players, organisers and fans and we look forward to the next year.