Season Autumn/Winter 2007

After nine tumultuous and torrid seasons, the love-hate relationship between the All Hacks and Insportz Oakleigh finally reached the end of its tether. Following last season's end-of-season debacle, where the greedy management of Insportz gave a "take-it-or-leave-it" ultimatum on the eve of the finals, the always loyal All Hacks finally realised that Insportz were never going to change their brazen contempt to their patrons. Citing irreconcilable differences, the All Hacks parted company, and took and indefinite break.

After much soul-searching, and taking time to heal our physical and emotional wounds, along came Anisha who seduced us with the idea of playing futsal in a mid-week Monash University league. At first reluctant to commit again to a league with the angst of more broken promises and dreams, Anisha offered low-cut fees, no long-term commitment necessary, and biased refereeing in our favour - sweeteners we simply couldn't turn down. One thing led to another, and soon enough the All Hacks had reformed. Welcome to Season 10 of Indoor Soccer / Futsal.

After that salacious Melrose Place-style introduction, now to more formal matters. A new playing court and surface, a new set of rules to learn. Futsal resembles a "mini-me" clone of conventional outdoor soccer, i.e. with field boundaries, corners, goal kicks, etc., but minus the offside rule. Also, no longer is the goalkeeper a protected species resting in the sanctuary of his restricted area, much to the dismay of Justin.

Squad: Ajay, Ara, Harinder, Justin (GK), Khar, Maal, Moe, Thanh

A new time, a new venue ... a familiar result. After being competitive for most of the match, the All Hacks' brief lapses of concentration were severely punished, as our opponents pounced on quick throw-ins and corner kicks to tap in easy goals. With Ajay having the honour of becoming our inaugural goal-scorer in futsal, it was an honourable defeat on our debut match.

1 - Ajay, Maal, Moe

4 - Moe
1 - Ajay, Maal, Yani

Squad: Ajay, Alex (II), Ara, Francis, Justin (GK), Maal, Ruiwen, Thanh

Francis recruited two new players, Alex and Ruiwen, who injected a burst of unbridled enthusiasm into a rapidly deteriorating culture of indifference within the All Hacks. The match easily could have been a different affair had the All Hacks converted their plethora of possession and shots on target early in the match into goals. As our opponents eventually settled, then controlled the tempo of the match, they frustratingly employed the "cherry picker" tactic - throwing or kicking the ball tantalisingly over the head of our last defender and just too far away from catching distance from our goalkeeper, but perfectly set up for their striker to tap the ball into the goal. The greatest form of flattery is imitation, so All Hacks tried to replicate their opponents' cheap tactic in the second half… with limited success. In a fitting finale, Maal kicked a goal late in the match to celebrate/commiserate his milestone 50th match for the All Hacks.

4 - Moe
2 - Maal
1 - Ajay, Ara, Yani

Squad: Ajay, Alex (II), Ara, David D., Harinder, Justin (GK), Justin A., Maal, Ruiwen

After struggling for the past nine seasons to gather a full squad week-in week-out, the All Hacks remarkably had the unfamiliar luxury of turning down players for this round's match, with Kheang and Thanh being given the dreaded "you're omitted due to team balance" excuse. Having learned from the sins committed in our previous matches, the All Hacks received some divine intervention via a strike by David that fortuitously deflected off an opposition defender into goal. An almost excellent first half was unfortunately spoiled in the last minutes, when the All Hacks conceded two late goals to relinquish the lead heading into half-time, an annoyingly all-too-familiar occurrence of late.

With Francis marshalling our substitutions to ensure we had fresh legs throughout the entire match to prevent another second half fade-out, the All Hacks staged a breath-taking resurgence in the second half. Ara’s blazing strike while on full steam along the right wing started an avalanche of goals, with Alex and David controlling mid-field and bamboozling our opponents with deft one-two combinations and clinical finishing in front of goal. After the All Hacks piled on five goals in a superb eight minutes of play, the All Hacks began to "ice" the clock, albeit a bit prematurely, with nine minutes to go. The momentum suddenly swung our opponents’ direction as they kicked the next two goals also in quick time. Fortunately, cool heads prevailed and the All Hacks absorbed the pressure in a pulsating finish to record our inaugural futsal victory.

4 - Moe
3 - Ara, David D.
2 - Alex (II), Maal
1 - Ajay, Yani

I acknowledge that I have been rather slack in updating the progress of the All Hacks, as the current season is already halfway through before embarking on writing this first newsletter of the season. Writer's fatigue, i.e. losing my "mojo", is an under-appreciated affliction in today's society, with people sending indiscriminate instant messages and SMS-texts, the traditional grammatically correct, thoughtfully structured, handwritten letter is a lost art. I am aware that I am writing an electronic form of communication in order to de-cry it, so don't point that out! (Thanks Sideshow Bob!)

For the very few who keenly looked forward to receiving these newsletters each week to follow the progress of our season, thus providing a short respite from their otherwise mundane lives, your patience is much appreciated ... while for the rest of the majority who missed their weekly compulsion of moving these newsletters straight into the "Trash" folder as soon as it was sent, well you’re probably not reading this anyway!

Savouring our inaugural futsal victory a bit too much, the All Hacks needed a whole month to recover and prepare ourselves for our next, and what turned out ultimately to be, our final match of the season. The sleeping giants of the competition, the All Hacks, finally came out of their winter hibernation after a month's retreat in the football wilderness, and had seemingly lost none of their enthusiasm for the game. But how things can quickly change in the space of 34 fateful minutes...

Squad: David D., Harinder, Justin (GK), Justin A., Kheang, Maal

The All Hacks had the perfect start to the match, with our first major attacking foray inside the first minute of play resulting in a goal, after Maal had crept up behind the opposition goalkeeper's field of sight to tap the ball into the unguarded goal. The All Hacks raced away to a 3-1 lead, with David being a constant menace to our opponents' defenders, culminating in a brilliant moment of a pure striker's instinct - a ballet-inspired, gracefully-balanced, turn-around, fade-away strike that Mikhail Baryshnikov would have applauded. Unfortunately, despite our fleet-footedness at times bamboozling our opponents, our opponents always seemed to have the last reply against the run of play. As has been our scourge for most of the season, the All Hacks faded away in the closing stages of a half, and with less than 10 seconds remaining in the first half, conceded a crucial late goal to trail 3-4 at half-time.

Our opponents skipped away to a 5-3 lead early in the second half, and our faint hopes of a semi-final berth was dwindling away with each passing minute, with each goal piercing through the back of our next being another nail hammered into our coffin. However, in an extraordinary transformation, the All Hacks breathed life back into the match, and their season, with three goals in quick succession turning the whole match on its head, with the highlight being a flamboyant back-heel, flick-pass from David that perfectly linked up with Maal, who surged down the left wing to score a wonderfully choreographed goal from an acute angle. Leading 6-5 with less than two minutes to play, the All Hacks almost managed to pull off the great Houdini escape ... but unfortunately, our last minute jitters came back to haunt us, as we failed to maintain possession and painfully conceded two late goals in the final two minutes of the match.

Our defeat from the jaws of victory snuffed out any hope of qualifying for the semi-finals, so there was not much to play for the rest of the season, except for pride ... which we don't have, so really, there was nothing to play for at all. What we lack in pride, we more that adequately make up for with dodginess, and consequently, the All Hacks donned our fake wigs, fled the scene of the crime post-haste, evaded the Monash authorities, and disappeared to make others (sorry, Anisha) liable for our outstanding match fees.