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Unfortunately the tournament got off to a bad start when heavy rain lead to the Saasveld fields at the NMMU campus being declared unplayable. Fortunately, after much running around we managed to find a local school field that was reasonable dry and moved the venue. As the school did not have lights all games were re fixtured to be played on the Saturday.

The morning matches got off to a crackerjack start when Rygersdal from Cape town showed their early intentions by thumping Corinthians from Johannesburg 5 – 0. After this early avalanche of goals things got a lot tighter with most games being very close affairs.

Virginia from Durban played excellent football but seemed to not be able to finish teams off. Rygersdal seemed early favourites after thumping Corinthians but then lost the next two games on the trot to make life difficult for themselves. Corinthians bounced back from their early defeat to beat the tournament winners, Stephanians aided by a great penalty save from the never short of a word keeper Steve. In fact some of the Corinthian boys claim they should have been awarded the tournament winners as they were they only side to beat Stephanians. This is almost as bad as the Jocks claiming Scotland should have been crowned world champs after they beat Argentina in a friendly just prior to Argentina winning the world cup in 86.

Bellville looked a really good side with an excellent midfield but paid the price for having a small squad and eventually ran out of legs. Friends were the surprise package of the day and after an extremely low key start began accumulating points as the day progressed with their never say die attitude. Chris Hendrix was a key player in their midfield and scored what was probably the goal of the tournament. Tech Stars played the most consistent football of the day finishing top after the round robin stage.

The final was contested by the two top sides. Namely Tech Stars and Stephanian Ottery. Tech who played good football at stages conceded an early goal and were unable to break down the solid Stephs defence. The cross came in from the corner and Winston Bailey rose above Alex Mountford to score. Stephs scored again when Tech was down to 10 players after a yellow cared lead to 3 minutes in the sin bin for Dale Wrede. The teams changed at 2 – 0 before Stephs finished All Stars off with a cracker from 20 yards. Final score 3 – 0.

The Final Dinner and Prize – giving was held at the King George Protea Hotel. This was a superb finale to the tournament with good food and good music from the Rolling Beat Survivors. Most teams decided to hit the town after the prize-giving and rumour has it that certain of the Tech Stars players only got in at 04h30 the next morning. A good time was had by all I suppose.

Stephs took the floating trophy home with them along with the gold medals while Tech Stars received silver medals. The players making the All Star side deservedly received free weekend holiday vouchers from the Wilderness beach hotel along with a golf shirt and certificate from SA Sports Tours. All team organisors received sweat tops from SA Sports Tours in gratitude for the work they put in organizing their teams particiopation in the 2006 tournament.

Final team placings were as follows:

            play won drawn lost for against points
Tech Stars   6    4    1    1    6     3      14
Stephs       6    3    2    1    6     3      12
Friends      6    2    3    1    3     2      10
Bellville    6    1    3    2    6     7       9
Virginia     6    1    3    2    6     8       8
Corinthians  6    1    3    2    3     8       7
Rygersdal    6    1    1    4    8     7       5

Plyers picked for Crunchie side:
1. Steve - Corinthians
2. Schiatti – Corinthians
3. Andy – Friends
4. Keith van Blerk – Rygersdal
5. Dale – Tech Stars
6. Hodgie – Tech
7. Smelly Nell – Virginia
8. Ibbi – Stephs
9. Phil Boosi – Virginia
10. George – Corinthians
11. Barry Willmot – Bellville

• The Zinedine Zidane award for losing his head went to William MaCorrison from Tech
• Worst referees decision went to Greg Nicholls.
• The Malcolm Lottering award for worst miss went to - ?
• Eric from Virginai received the Vicks Medinite award after suffering concussion and spending the evening puking his heart out. A touch rough me thinks but there was no one else in line to win the award.

The All Stars side made up of the best 11 players of the tournament was chosen by the referees and the tournament director as follows:
1. Geof
2. Amandu – Friends
3. Ian Judd – Tech Stars
4. Cable – Stephs
5. Bruce – Virginia
6. Chris Hendrix – Friends
7. Johnny Grant – Tech
8. Greg - Virginia
9. Robbie Benadie – Bellville
10. John Goodwins – Rygersdal
11. Winston Bailey – Stephs

• Player of the tournament – Winston Bailey
• Top Goal scorer – Also Winston Bailey on 5 goals.

We look forward to seeing you all back next year another year older, a yard slower but as keen as mustard. Lets pray we do not have any further problems with rain and we are able to make use of the Saasveld campus and split the event over two days.

If you haven't done so yet, check out the photos