Day 8 -Second Day of the Sanix Tournament

Today was another hot day in Fukuoka. We stayed near our hotel in the morning and then caught the train and shuttle bus back to the Global Arena to catch the second game for Earl Marriott. Today they played a team from a high school in Osaka, Japan. This team is the Japanese National champs!! We know that our boys are a good team in Surrey but here, every team is huge, experienced and good!! Earl Marriott played their best and were awesome today. They had to battle very hard and were very strong against this team. The score was quite close in the first half and then our team made a few mistakes and the Osaka team was so quick to score when we did. No matter what the scoreboard says, when Earl Marriott leaves Japan, they will be a much better team. They are learning so much from playing against these strong teams! And the experience that they are getting is incredible.

If anyone would like to watch the boys play, here is a link to the first half of yesterday's game. If you would like to watch more, let me know and I can send you more links...Can you see Nick score his try?

http://youtu.be/brCu59jLjvA

The final score in today's game was 31-0...here is your challenge of the day...what are all the possible ways that Osaka could have received 31 points?...remember it is 5 points for a try and 2 points for a conversion kick. Teams can also get 3 points if they make a penalty kick (this is just like the problem solving problem we did with the stamps and coins...you can do it).

 Heading onto the field to play the game.

 Nick is in the middle. He plays a position called hooker. The two teams join together to make a scrum. Each team links together with each other and then the referee says, "crouch, touch, set" and the 2 teams come together, head to head. Then the team that has possession of the ball has one of their players called the scrum-half put the ball in the middle of the scrum, along a tunnel on the ground between the 2 teams. It is the hooker's job to "hook" the ball with his (or her...girls play rugby too!) feet to get it backwards to a player outside of the scrum. Both teams are trying to hook the ball so you have to be strong. Once it is outside of the scrum, the team can pick it up and start passing and try to move forward down the field.

This is a scrum.

 Nick after the game...he is pretty sweaty and stinky!

 A photo with Earl Marriott and the team from Osaka, after the game. Our Earl Marriott boys brought 6 extra green and orange tye-dye t-shirts with them. After each game, they give one of their t-shirts to a player on the other team. These t-shirts are VERY popular here and everyone wants to play Canada so that they can get one of the t-shirts. In the evenings, the teams all hang out together outside of their dorms. Some of the teams trade things that they have brought with them and they are all trying to get these t-shirts but the boys do not have extras to trade!

 Earl Marriott after the game...they played so well, even  though they lost!!

 Go Canada Go!!!

 Nick was so stinky and sweaty!!!

 Some of the boys heading back to the dorm after the game.

 Nick

 Yeah Canada!

 Some of the boys needed to put ice on their sore parts.

 Inside the dorm...they even hung up a few things.

Nick again, see you tomorrow!