Day 14 - Sun 26th Oct 08

Woke up a little nervous today. There is a real buzz around the camp in anticipation of the game tomorrow. Breakfast is as normal but today we are into last game day prep, we try to get all our last preparations in, for some of us it was back to bed after breakfast as we have video sessions to watch later and the captains training run at 6pm tonight.

At midday the video sessions of the opposition start. We study their weaknesses, their strengths and then alter strategies based on who will be playing in what position for both the opposition and us and also based on pitch position. We find out a lot from these sorts of sessions as it highlights the way teams play and also serves to identify the defects they have defensively as teams and as individuals. The video sessions are broken into forwards, backs and combined team sessions which lead in well to a small feed before we head to Paramatta stadium.

We got to the stadium around 6.30, a similar time to what we would be playing at tomorrow. This was important so that we can see and feel exactly what it is like to play at this time, what temperature it is likely to be, what the lighting conditions will be how much water we will need. Everyone seems really excited and training goes brilliantly with no dropped balls at all. Finishing training on a high leads into the game well leaving everyone itching to get started.

This all brings about a bit of realisation that tomorrow we begin our battles and that we will be playing for our country in the 2008 World cup.


Talk soon

Ben

Ni Neart go cur le cheile