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INVITATIONAL GAMES FOR THE DEAF - TAIWAN 2008

Posted on 22nd September 2008

Just recently, the Taipei Deaflympics 2009 committee held an invitational games tournament that consisted of football, judo, wrestling, karate and other sports as warm up for the Deaflympics 2009. Deaf Football Australia was fortunate to be invited and participate in the Invitational Games.

The Squad attended camp at Parklea, NSW under experienced coaches and ex Socceroos players Abbas Saad and Robert Stanton. We welcomed back some past players and started training again to regain fitness and polish our skills. Baulkham Hills Under 21 was invited to participate in a friendly against the new refreshed Australian Deaf team and the game ended up 1-1 draw. Abbas Saad and Robert Stanton expressed their delight and worked together to ensure we were ready to face against 2 other opponents which were yet to be determined until arrival in Taipei. Other football nations that were invited were: Malaysia, Thailand, Japan, Iran, and Uzbekistan.

Upon arrival in Taipei, we were greeted by volunteers of the Taipei Invitational Games and we were surprised at their big friendly reception towards us. We all felt very welcome and happy to be in Taipei, but the biggest thing we weren’t looking forward to was the weather, which greeted us upon exit of the international airport.

The accommodation was fantastic and we were fortunate enough to be staying at a 5 star hotel with fantastic food and rooms. The tour program went to plan and we trained hard under extreme conditions. However the morale was high and we were ready to face against Uzbekistan and Thailand for the group stages. We were determined to come out with a win against Uzbekistan and we were fortunate to lead 1-0 early thanks to a great goal from forward Marc Valente. However Uzbekistan pulled one back through a lucky shot and we ended up with 1-1 draw.

Our next game was against Thailand and we were determined to fight nail and tooth after our heavy defeat in Greece at the World Deaf Football Championships. We went down 3 - 0 but everyone was extremely high spirited and gave everything we got. Abbas and Robert were really pleased and taught us well at training that gave us a result 3 - 0 instead of another 10 - 0.

Most of the boys were feeling pretty worn out by the last game against Iran and unfortunately we went down 8 - 0. Our lack of fitness was pretty much the biggest let down that brought this result, but overall we learnt well under the guidance of Abbas Saad and Robert Stanton and we hope to work again with them in the future. Deaf Football Australia would like to say thank you to Abbas Saad and Robert Stanton for their hard work and time into Deaf Football Australia.

The Australian Squad returned home on September 11th and Deaf Football Australia is already working on arranging future tournaments. We hope to keep working hard to regain our place among the world’s best.

Deaf Football Australia Archive List

Archives are available for viewing, please click on the links below to read past news.

25/05/11 - Southern Cross 2011 Results

29/04/11 - Asia Pacific 2011 Diary

08/01/11 - Australia Deaf vs Marconi Under 20s

27/04/10 - Southern Cross 2010 Results

26/07/09 - Australia vs Ghana match held at Belmore Sports Stadium

14/04/09 - Southern Cross 2009 Results

22/09/08 - MP Ninos Khoshaba’s Address in NSW Parliament

22/09/08 - Invitational Games of the Deaf - Taipei 2008

Deaf Football Australia Archive News