Over the last few days Lanna attended the BISP Soccer 7s tournament for the second year running. With 1,500 players, 145 teams, and 41 International schools from 10 countries participating this year, the tournament is one of the largest and most prestigious of its kind in South-East Asia. Once again we represented the school in the Over-15 Boys category, and for the first time we were also able to take a girls team to the tournament, in the Over-15 Girls category.
And what a year it was for the girls! In a competitive group, the girls looked right at home and put in some excellent performances against some high-level teams. They narrowly missed out on qualifying for the cup competition, and instead went into the plate competition on day 2. A strong quarter-final performance saw them defeat Taylor’s International School, Puchong 3-0, with a brace from Cathy Chailangkarn and a further goal from Captain Claudia Depaepe. In the semi-finals, a hard fought and physical game saw the girls defeat the British International School of Phuket 1-0, with another stunning goal from Cathy. In the final the girls came up against St Andrews International School, Rayong, who had previously defeated them in the group 1-0. The girls were easily the better team for the duration of the match and gave everything they could, but were unable to score, with the result 0-0 at full time. Unfortunately this meant penalties to decide the championship, and the girls were incredibly unlucky to just miss out on 1st place, despite a heroic save from goalkeeper Elise Proux. To have gotten into a final at such a big tournament is a huge achievement in itself, particularly in their first time attending, and we are very proud of this team and how well they played throughout the tournament.
This year our boys were drawn in a particularly tough group. They were unfortunate not to qualify for the cup, despite some courageous performances against the teams in their group, which included both the eventual winners (British International School Phuket) and runners up (Alice Smith School) of the cup competition in this category. In the plate quarter finals against Epsom College Malaysia, the boys dominated the game in terms of pressure and possession, but just weren’t able to score in regular time. In the penalty shootout they were unlucky to be knocked out, and prevented from reaching the semi-finals. This was a young team, many of whom were playing in the older age group for the first time, and they did themselves proud with some excellent individual and team performances over the 2 day tournament.
A huge well done to all of our players, and a big thank you to Mr Ash and Ms Laura for all their hard work organising and coaching at the tournament this year, and Ms Sadie for her coaching in the run-up to the tournament.
