Its January the 68th 2023, well that’s what it feels like as we are deep into January now, and I saw the New Year in with a viral infection that rendered me almost completely deaf, deafer than I already were. People are talking about Prince Harry as he sets off a huge bomb under Buckingham Palace, metaphorically of course, and the whole world is either for him or against him, there’s no in-between. The last time I saw the world up in arms over something so big was the Twilight Saga, and it was either Team Edward or Team Jake… I was of course Team Jake, and I am now and always will be Team Harry. One certainly must make their line in the sand, and I’m proud he is finally making a stand against the blood sucking, cold hearted, Cullen family… I mean the British Press. However, I digress ever so slightly. It has been a little over three months since our glorious gold medal win in Bangkok, Dec 2022, and it still brings a smile to my face when I look at the medal, which is proudly mounted next to all my other note worthy achievements like my Invictus Games medals, Orienteering trophy and even a 100% Attendance Certificate for that academic school year that I had to collect in front of the whole school one morning in Assembly. Making myself a hard target by zig zagging through the corridors trying to avoid an ultra wedgie from the older kids really put me in good stead for the Infantry later on in life.
It has been three long years, due to the Pandemic, since the Great Britain Para Ice Hockey Team has been on the ice in a competitive role. So, it’s fair to say that as we lined up on the blue line for our 1st game of the Bangkok Worlds, C Pool ready to battle it out with the hosts Thailand, there were a few nerves flying around. The Ref blew his whistle, and the game was on, all nerves were forgotten about, it was muscle memory and training that took over. The 1st period was a little tentative from us, however by the end of the 15 minutes we were pretty much dominating the game in all aspects. The hosts gave it everything in front of a packed out stadium with onlookers supporting the Thai team. It was incredible to see a team pretty much in its infancy step up and host an official IPC sanctioned Tournament in Bangkok, Thailand. I know, I still need to pinch myself a little as when it was announced that the Tournament was going to be in Thailand, I laughed thinking it was a joke. However, I do believe, with a lot of help and funding from the nearby countries, they will be up there competing for that gold medal in Pool C in no time. GB’s first game ended in a convincing 11-0 win against the host and set the tone for the rest of the tournament.
Game two would see Great Britain battle it out against the French. We were hoping being the French they would just surrender on the battlefield; however, they fought valiantly even when their Captain was severely injured with a concussion by one of our guys that lost his edge and crashed into the French guy’s head rendering him unconscious and ultimately being stretchered off the ice. Our guy was penalised severely with a 2 minute plus 5 minute roughing, but as it was at the end of the 3rd period, we were not left short-handed for more than a couple minutes. That left the French quite angry as they didn’t get the full amount of penalty time against us. They tried to complain to the IPC saying they wanted a bigger sanction, but after careful review the original penalty was upheld. Again, this didn’t go down well and our player who caused the injury tried to go and apologise for the incident, but the French were having none of it and wouldn’t accept his apology. They didn’t even want him near their dressing room. I’ve reviewed the incident over and over again and yes it was a careless check on the French guy, but by no means was it malicious in anyway shape or form. Sometimes these things happen in sport. I mean Para Ice Hockey is a contact sport and people will undoubtedly get injured. Suck it up Team France. Shit happens. We took that game 8-0 and not a single shot was taken by the French, so we were very pleased with ourselves.
Game three saw us face off against the Austrians who do have a long history of sledge hockey in their country, so we knew they had the knowledge to do well. What we didn’t realise is how physical and scrappy this game would be. The 1st period was where it all went wrong for us really. Right from the whistle the Austrians dominated us physically and we just weren’t ready or expecting it and it shocked us a little and we suffered for it. As a team we couldn’t get on top of it properly and we were getting stressed to the point where our game play was being affected. Won’t lie to you the Austrians were playing some very dirty tactics and illegal hits on us that the Refs were not calling and a few times there was nearly a full-on scrap on the ice, and it was mainly all down to the Refs incompetence and not being able to control the game. The GB team have three women in the squad and the only team to do so in Pool C. The only team to call them out were the Austrians. Never have I been so disappointed in para ice hockey players who were making sexist and derogatory remarks towards the female players openly in the game and in front of the Refs, who I might add, did nothing to stop it from happening. We, as a team, put in a complaint against them with the IPC as that sort of behaviour is totally unacceptable in any Co-Ed sport not just sledge hockey.
Once we realised what was happening and what sort of game this was going to be we matched the intensity and then raised the bar back at them. We started to hit them hard and then it was their turn to get flustered and ultimately it cost them the game as we romped home with a 7-0 victory, and another game of no shots on goal. There was a lot of animosity coming from some of the Austrian players, one of them being the captain. Once the whistle has gone whatever happened on the ice gets forgotten about, and you put your differences aside and shake the other teams hand as a sign of respect. It is frowned upon greatly if you disrespect the Refs and or the players by not shaking hands. Well, some of the Austrians didn’t touch gloves or if they did there was some profanities thrown in as well. The positives that came from that game was that I got the MVP (Most Valuable Player) award. It was totally unexpected as I thought others did a better job than I did. I accepted graciously of course, and it is now on display next to my other noteworthy accolades. I came off the ice very happy, however I really didn’t like the game we played against the Austrians and thought it was our worst game we played so far. After watching the game back, I changed my mind as it was probably our best game of the tournament. Not sure if it was the intensity that we were forced to bring or what, but it was a good game to watch back.
We now had two days off for a bit of sightseeing and rest before our gold medal match against Kazakhstan. This would be a whoever wins gets gold and promotion up to Pool B. The few days off we had were a God send really. Our physio therapist was in full use trying to fix the aches and strains from playing a tournament of full contact, and the body, even a totally 100% fit one, needs rest from a full schedule of game time. So, a load of us ventured out into Bangkok to see some very famous temple, and to buy some of the cheap and nasty souvenirs you pick up from a marketplace to give to your loved ones back home. In all honesty it was just nice to get out of the hotel and see some of Bangkok. A few of us ended up in a nice coffee shop right by the river and chilled there till our taxi came back for us. The weather was always hovering around 30 Degrees Celsius day and night, rain or shine with the added bonus of 100% humidity as well. Whatever you wore it was drenched in sweat within minutes of venturing outside.
After our delicious coffee and a little food, we got the taxi to an open street food marketplace in another part of Bangkok, that took us an hour and a half to get to. Right at the start of this journey my guts were gurgling away, and I put it down to the coffee that I probably shouldn’t have had. Being a spinal injury person, my guts are not the best, and any change in food or drink away from the norm is likely to give me a dodgy stomach, if you catch my drift. This is Thailand… the land of spicy food everywhere. So, I’m sat in this taxi with half the team all around me, and my stomach starts to gurgle, and my face is turning pale white. I knew what was coming, and the worried look on my face was not hiding anything. I immediately had the front row of seats to myself as people in the taxi treated me like a hand grenade primed to blow at any second. I was looking for side streets that the taxi could pull into, and let me hang my arse out the door and blow like a claymore into the side street. Otherwise this claymore was gonna go off in the taxi, and it was going to be a right mess. At this point I was feeling sick as well, so I knew I was ill. The only thing on my mind was… what was worse for the people in the back… me being sick everywhere or my whole world falling out my arse, and still an hour away from the safe zone of the hotel. With my lack of sphincter control (being a spinal) it was just a case of ‘when’ not ‘if’ it would happen.
Someone handed me a plastic bag in case I needed it… it was better than nothing I suppose. The whole journey I was trying to clench my imaginary sphincter muscles while wiping the sweat off my brow. I could hear laughter from behind and knew exactly who it was, but I couldn’t move or be angry as that would clench muscles I didn’t want to clench right now. I literally had to just sit there with a look on my face as if someone was trying to explain Algebra to me. After an hour of doing my best David Blaine impression we were finally there at the open street market, and not more than 100 metres away I saw the sign for toilets. ‘I’m going to make it’ I said to myself. I walked into the shopping mall found the nearest disabled toilet, locked myself in there and settled down to what I can only describe as a world of hurt followed by complete relief.
I spent 45 minutes emptying my body of any waste product it had ever consumed. Oh the trials and tribulations of being a disabled person. They never tell you any of this when you’re in hospital with a broken back. Having a spinal injury means you have to accept that sometimes you will urinate and defecate oneself every now and then. It is something that you must contend with no matter how long you have been injured or if you think you have a grip on things. It’s still embarrassing to do either in public if and when you get caught short. You just have to ride it out or do what a friend does when it happens to him. Deny, deny, deny! The Russians do it so well, why not adopt that same strategy. So, while everybody else ate gorgeous smelling and tasting street food I was on water and dashing to the toilet every 30 mins. Anyway, I was just about okay to get on the ice for the gold medal match against the Kazakhstan team.
Being in the gold medal match was an unfamiliar feeling for the GB Team. So, you can understand that we were all pretty nervous getting on to the ice, however, the experience we had on the bench calmed everyone down, and in the end it was pretty simple… Lose the game, we stay in Pool C proving some people right back home who have been waiting for our demise, Or… win this game like we are supposed to and prove all the haters wrong and ascend to Pool B like gold medal champs that we know we are. The Kazakhstan team fought valiantly however; in the end it was only ever going to go one way. We took that game 7-0 and completely dominated the Kazakhstan team as we took gold in Pool C of the Para Ice Hockey World Championships in Bangkok. After the game was done the coach told us that due to Poland dropping out of Pool B there would be two teams going into Pool B, Kazakhstan and us, Great Britain. We collected our gold medals shortly after the game and then it was on to a celebratory drink or three and some food. We couldn’t go too hard as we had to fly out the next morning back to the UK, however we did have a few beers with the other teams as well.
It is the middle of the summer and training for the next Worlds in the later part of 2023 have already begun. The team will be going into the Worlds in high spirits off the back of the gold medal match, however getting into Pool B just means that things are getting harder and we will have to play better and smarter than we ever have to stay in Pool B and possibly fight for a medal. Won’t lie to you, it will be very hard, however I truly believe we can do it. I suppose only time will tell.
Until next time folks…