Ending The Waiting Game

After 44 years of long wait and agonizing hurts, the Spanish National Football Team won the European Championship last June, thus taken off the "underachievers" tag for now. Meanwhile, the Summer Olympics will take place in Beijing next month, same goes to the new football season. For some teams and athletes, it's all about "ending the waiting game".

Take both Tennis World no.1 Roger Federer and Badminton World no.1 Lin Dan for example. Both dominate their respective sports scene in recent years, being the top of the world for a couple of years, winning grand slams after grand slams... yet they fail to capture the Olympic Gold since the start of their careers. Lin Dan, most notably, was (surprisingly) beaten by Singapore's Ronald Susilo in the opening round of the Athens Games 4 years ago...

Both are still at the top of their games now.(Even though Federer ended his Wimbledon winning run recently to the World no.2 Rafael Nadal...)... and they are there in Beijing to end such hurtful run in the Olympics if not they will have to wait another 4 years...

Next is the Brazil Olympics Football Team... as we know...the Brazilians is the greatest football nation... 5 times World Champions. Yet in the history of the Olympics, they had never won the GOLD, despite producing legends like Pele, Zico, Ronaldo...to add salt to their wounds, bitter South American Arch Rivals -- Argentina, was the winner 4 years ago (while the Brazilians did not even qualify.)... while lesser known footballing nations like Nigeria, Cameroon, Poland, Belgium and even Canada won the gold before. While the Olympics squad(a team of u23 players + 3 overage players) will step foot in Singapore to set up their training camp and play a friendly against a Singapore Selection side, the team, which perhaps the strongest Olympics side consisting of stars like Ronaldinho, Lucas, Diego, Anderson, Pato and Jo...etc etc, will be out to end that long wait of a GOLD medal.

Speaking of the Olympics, another team which is out to end such long years of hurt is our TEAM Singapore. When was the last time Singapore won a medal? 48 years ago... when Singapore has just started self-governance, had not joined Malaysia yet, let alone gained independence... and the lone medal, a sliver, was won by Tan Howe Liang... a Weightlifter. During those days... Singapore was just a 3rd World country... of course no talks of monetary rewards like what it is now.

While in recent years, we may have won lots of medals in Commonwealth, Asian and SEA Games, breaking medal tally after medal tally records... we have been fallen short of a second Olympic medal in history. 4 years ago it is soo hurtful to see Singapore getting soo far yet soo close to just a medal... I remembered watching Susilo on TV mobile in the bus... getting thrashed in the quarter finals by a Thai shuttler by the name of Boonsak Ponsana despite looking promising especially after the win over Lin Dan. Then the next disappointments... an agonizing 4th...yet another 4th in Table Tennis. That time was by (Susilo's then gf) Li Jia Wei... when she could have won the semi-finals earlier. That's a saying, "Being 2nd is nothing."... but for Team Singapore in the Olympics, "Being 4th is no Medal...not even bronze."

While the opening of the Olympics took place on 8 Aug, our National Day is a day later. Please do the nation proud by capturing a medal... finally...We have enough of waiting for just a Olympic medal when we saw our neighbouring countries had their names in the medal tally over the years.

Over in football, the new football season starts next month too... Liverpool once again... determines to end the soon-to-be 19 years of long wait for a domestic league title, although the challenges are getting harder and harder over the years, especially with the wealthiness of Chelsea and Man U. And the Reds are looking soo cash-strapped just to bid for a midfielder named Gareth Barry !!!

Newcastle United... a football club with a large fan base, with one of the largest stadiums in England, yet being a very unachieving side over soo many years. The last time they won a major trophy was in 1969. And for that almost 50 years, teams like Wimbledon(now MK Dons...???), Coventry City, Portsmouth...etc etc achieved glories. Even the legendary Alan Shearer could not help taking his hometown club to glory during his stint at the club. For the new season, I do hope they can breakthrough, win something like League Cup or FA Cup perhaps.

In my own point of view, everyone will also have to play these "waiting games" in their various aspects of life, be it in Career, Studies, Sports and Relationships... it's kind of overcoming "karma", challenges which one ought to breakthrough. Take the case of myself, I have been playing the waiting game of "finding the right one", a true love aka soulmate...especially when I had to go through a couple of heart-breaking, "no-chance", one-sided relationships in the past 10 years of hurt. I am not being desperate, just that being single for that long and never have a relationship before sometimes may feel the emptiness inside. 一个人偶尔感到寂寞再所难免...

I may have said all these before. But I have to overcome such heavy karma and have the good fortune to find the right one, and no more one-sided love hurts.