Lessons from Oasis 06

An old rugby coach once told me, "you never really loose from a defeat providing you learn from it," If everyone took something positive from Oasis 06 that will make you stronger in the future then we didn’t loose anything. In retrospect it was a hard weekend. Being drawn in the larger pool in the mens category along with a tough mixed pool and half the team being drafted to referee was physically and mentally exhausting. These are not excuses being highlighted. Instead I’m proud that no one moaned or complained and everyone played until they literally broke themselves. In the last two games we were dropping like flies, subbing off only stretch out a cramp before going in to replace a teammate with the same problem. A fond memory for me will be Sujan motioning for me to stay down after suffering a bad calf cramp during the mixed final while he and the team covered for me. It’s a great feeling to know someone’s got your back but its an even better feeling knowing you’ve got someone else’s.

We didn’t keep our clean sheet and we didn’t win Oasis but we lost to a skillful team who flew in New Zealand ringers to beat us. It’s good to hear how disappointed everyone is in loosing; it demonstrates how much pride is on the line each time we play. Defeat is bitter but it emphasizes how sweet victories are. In the grand scheme of things we need teams like Wanderers and Bro-town to up the anti so we in turn improve. Playing touch just wouldn’t be as fun if we won every game by 5 tries, we need the prospect of difficult games and potential defeat to keep up the pressure and maintain our focus. Personally I prefer begin the underdog again.

A lot has been said in the aftermath of Oasis about what could have been if we’d prepared as hard for the tournament as we did for NTL. For NTL the team made sacrifices to squeeze in 3 sessions a week, no more so than Leander. The NTL training paid off, the result being history. I think this one photo sums up the effort put in vs. reward gained. For most the feeling of winning is “jubilation” but for the one guy who made it all happen the feeling is just relief at a job well done. Similarly the same guy will find defeat particularly irritating.



Oasis was always going to be difficult for us. 6 pack is a young team the majority of members are still studying. As such our numbers will always suffer during the exam period but it’s a small price to pay to maintain such a young damn good-looking bunch of players.

So to summaries;
Learn something from defeat
6 pack needs a nemesis (of sorts)
Effort = reward
The team needs to take some of the burden off the captain’s shoulders
We are good looking