Casual Soccer and Basketball in Sydney

I have recently partaken in several games of pick-up or casual soccer and basketball with students and locals from the area. Many of the students for soccer are in a similar situation as me, where we play at our home uni's but do not want to pay $400 to play for the uni squad here. For me, I not only use casual soccer to work on my skills and keep my touch on the ball but also for fun because I love the game. There are many students and locals that just come out to play with us for fun too.

For pick-up soccer, we have created an online group so that we can organize events that most everyone can come to. Usually it works out for us to play at least twice per week and  we get enough for two full teams. As the name implies, the structure is very laid back and nobody gets too intense with fouling or arguing about rules. Everyone is there for pretty much the same reasons and nobody really worries about the score.

My experience with pick-up basketball, however is somewhat different. I have only gone a few times, but my friends and I just try to get five players together (enough for one team) and then head over to a nearby park. When we get there, we warm-up a little and within 10-15 minutes a group of local guys come around and we challenge them to a game. The games usually get pretty intense and the locals especially get into fouling and playing a little cheap. However, it never gets too bad where anyone gets hurt and they are fairly chill about stopping the game to solve a quick issue (foul, injury, etc.).

As the majority of players come from various parts of the world, sports are a good way for us to relate to each other and come together as a team. Even though many of the players speak broken English or have different accents, casual soccer and basketball (among other sports) allow us to communicate to each other in various ways through the game. This has been a great experience and way for me to meet new people and enjoy some good exercise too. I think when sports are structured in a casual manner such as this, it allows other people (especially youth athletes) to enjoy the same experiences and meet new people just as I have.

Boost Mobile SurfSho at Bondi Beach

  They had massive tents set up, with advertisements crawling all over the beach. Some of the advertisments include tents with competitions for prizes, a big screen with replays and commercials playing (shown above), and even people walking around as advertisements (Blackberry phone, Red Bull ladies, etc.). There were even advertisements on people walking down the beach with wetsuits and bikini's on. For such a massive amount of people present (several thousand), I am sure it was a good promotion opportunity for all of the sponsors present.

   There were a variety of people present at the show including kids, genuine fans, tourists, and even locals who were just out to catch some rays (shown above). Everyone got involved with the cheering and supporting the surfers when they performed a gnarly trick or even just an attempt. The participation level varied from old to young, male to female. All participants were professional (or very skilled wildcard) world-class competitors. With all of the sponsors and fans present, especially the youth crowd and competitors, it showed me how important surfing is to Australian culture. The fact that younger competitors are endorsed by big name company's provides others in the country (especially youth) to aspire to be like them. Overall, the crowd had a positive participation. There were of course some die-hard fans that would yell out every hour or so, but the majority of people were just looking for a good show. No arguments or fights of any kinds developed; it was really just a great opportunity for people of all ages and surfing knowledge to get together and appreciate a friendly show.
   This was different to most youth sports that I am familiar with in the U.S. We generally do not have individual sports sponsored at such a high level as surfing is here. It is usually a team that is endorsed, so seeing 10 year old kids endorsing advertisements is somewhat new to me. The skills of these youth competitors was world-class, too. However, as suggested by the name, it was more of a show than competition. Even though there was a prize for the men's group, all of the youth participants were there just to put on a show for the crowd. Therefore, there wasn't any stress put on them to win anything (although perhaps a bit of rivalry between them to do the best trick). This was good because there weren't any fans or coaches pushing them to win anything. They had about an hour or so out on the water to pretty much express themselves and their style. This made the competition strictly Australian for me in a way because of how relaxed the atmosphere was. Since no pressure was placed on winning, it was nice to watch youth competitors at the highest level compete just for fun.
   I believe that some social and cultural learning was achieved for much of the crowd at the show. Especially for us foreign members; I think we all learned that it can still be fun to watch a competition without much stress placed on winning. This can translate into a valuable lesson for primary school education, if they were to have events like this. They could see how it is okay to just compete for fun, even at the top level of competition. This would benefit their learning with regards to sports competitions and overall life outlook. A possible negative effect, however which should be monitored, is that kids could take this relaxed competition style and translate it into other aspects of their life (that should be taken seriously). This could be detrimental if they lived their entire lifestyle this way. Although, as far as sports learning is concerned, this could be a beneficial lesson for kids to learn.