Amigo's and Amiga's,

Finally the good weather arrived and with all other leagues
finished in the rest of the word all the the eyes are on the
SPL !

I had the pleasure of watching the Semi Cup Final Dulwich vs
Galacticos and what a "Thriller" it was. MJ must have been
proud......!

Dulwich started stronger and seems more eager to take a
place in the final. For 30 minutes there was no shot on
either goal and all the battles were fought over on the
midfield. I was about to fall asleep.....Just at the end of
the first half Dulwich scored a header from a free kick.
Second half it was the opposite Galacticos turned on the
"war" button and there was a series of attacks. They had
numerous occasions to score but finally Ned found the Net !
1-1 !
Dulwich could only defend and 8 minutes before time it
looked as Galacticos sealed it ! 2-1 !  Dulwich pushed
forward and almost got rewarded when a long cross seemed to
fly in but a brilliant safe of Santi saved the Queen !
However the following corner landed straight on the head of
Chris Balls and the ball flew thru the Net.
So it was a penalty shoot out ! This one can straight go
into the SPL records books. Both teams missed one but after
that every taker scored.......we were at 10-10 !! when the
drama unfolded. As all the players took a penalty it was
down to the goalies. Poor Santi who had a great game shot
over and the Dulwich goalie made no mistakes and shot
Dulwich into the SPL final on June 20th !

Flamenkos - ERS 7-4 Old rivals but no cards shown and goals
everywhere ! ERS was playing well especially in the first
half but a tactical move after the break to call back Danny
(after two years absence) as goalie proofed deadly and
secured the Flamenkos the third place spot this season.

This weekend we have 4 important games and the weather
forecast is excellent Sunny and 28 degrees !! So bring your
girlfriends to the field and show them your capabilities to
score goals and score credits !

9.30    Super 48 - Flamenkos
11.30  Dulwich - ERS
13.30  Japan-Bulls
15.30  Lions-Hawks

For some teams it will be their last game this season others
still have to catch up a few games !  Life is good now and
we need to enjoy it ! That means ice cold beers after a good
game of Football !

Keep 20 June free in your agenda as we have a Fun Tournament
plus the end of the season party + price ceremony !

See you all on Sunny Sunday ! Cheers Freek / SPL President
on behalf of the Committee !

Amigo's and Amiga's,

You only know what you miss if you don't have it ! So last
weekend I was in Singapore as coach of my sons soccer team
and I truly missed the action of the SPL. They were
competing in the sizzling heat for two days (Shanghai
weather is not so bad after all....) With  over  80 teams
from all over the region. Its interesting to see how fast
young soccer players are developing their skills. On one
side you see giant kids playing in the under 12 and they
would be taller than the average length of the SPL players,
excluding Japan ! On the other side you see real good
talented footballers who could easily be, within a couple of
years, one of our better players in the SPL. So our future
looks good and we hope to bring in more young and talented
players into our League in the years to come.

We had 4 games on the menu and were lucky the predicted
rainfall didn't materialize.

Japan - Hawks        3-1

Lions - Bulls            5-2

ERS - Galacticos    2-3

Dulwich - Super 48 5-1

So after this round we are left with two or three games for
each team and its confirmed that this year title will either
go to Japan or the Lions. It will be decided in the next
couple of weeks and maybe even in the last and final match !
The third place will as well be decided in the final games
and who knows maybe Super 48 can clinch their first ever win
! Exciting times for all of us especially with the World-Cup
fever starting to heat up !

Amigo's and Amiga's,

The Expo opening excitement is fading and now all eyes and
attention will be on the last playing rounds of the SPL.
There are several teams battling for glory and even Super 48
is fighting hard to get their first win of the season !
We got rain again last Sunday and it seems that this season
the weather continues to be a major (disturbing) factor.
Rain means a slippery pitch and it boils down to technical
play !  So lets see the results of this weekend !

Japan - Galacticos 6-1 Just check out the Galacticos report
of the game and indeed the early games for them are always a
challenge as alarm clocks "made in China" doesn't seem to
work on an early Sunday morning and the fact that it was
raining at 2 AM that was enough for some Galacticos player
to think that SPL games would be cancelled ! But don't
forget we have our Grass-Master Adam and the pitch was
perfect again so Japan was there with 30 players and they
were there hungry and keen to clinch their first ever SPL
Champion-Ship ! First Half was 5-0 just because of the
numbers and the second half Galacticos realized they wasted
a chance to give Japan their first loss this season they
drew 1-1 but that was only the second half.

Dulwich - ERS 1-1 Good battle of football and both side
struggled a bit to control the ball on the wet field.
Dulwich took the lead but were put behind when their striker
Jamie was send off. This gave the French players confidence
and they started to dominate the game. A fantastic header of
Yannick gave them a well deserved draw. During the
celebrations the goal scorer was almost killed as they tried
to find outs whether his chest could hold 10 ERS players on
top of him. Luckily for him / his team and the SPL he
survived....!

Super 48 - Flamenkos 1-5 Full credits to Super 48 and I
think their team spirit is unbelievable ! Having not won any
game and conceded over 100 goals they are always there with
over 20 player and they always put a smile on their face.
Honestly I love that they fighting very hard for that one
goal per game and versus the much better Flamenkos they got
it again. Think we can learn a lot from their team Spirit as
we all know how hard it is when you lose several games and
the spirit is down but they are the same team and nice
people when they started in our League ! I say Chapeau !
Hats-Off and have no idea how to say that in Japanese !
Flamenkos just has a "Bad Day in the Office" against Super
48 !

Bulls - Hawks 5-0 Hawks was not able to field enough players
for this replay game. But the key was that the friendship
and the fair-play was more important than the result and so
it was ! High-light for me was seeing Bilgin our "Blog
Master" playing in a Hawk shirt ! Not sure whether this was
a pre-signal for the 2011 transfer window which will open
right after the World-Cup !

For now we are really going to have a SUNNY SUNDAY and we
have all important games to watch ! Forget the Expo come
straight to Green City and watch the SPL games ! No queues
and we don't charge, free entertainment of the highest level
in Shanghai subject to the "made in China" alarm clocks of
course !


9.30 AM Japan - Hawks The former Champions versus the
potential SPL Champions, what else you wish for ??

11.30 AM Bulls - Lions Big game for both teams and I can
guarantee it will not be 0-0 !

13.30 PM Galacticos - ERS Perfect game for the bottom teams
who want to get out of the bottom so it will be a battle
field. England - France, a world cup semi final ??

15.30 PM Super 48 - Dulwich maybe a Super Surprise .......!

Enjoy the final games in our SPL season and remember the
Friendship and Fairplay are far more important than the
result so make sure we don't need to show red cards this
time !

Wish you Great Games and Sportsmanship on Sunday !

Cheers Freek / SPL President on behalf of the SPL Committee
!