Published: Wednesday, 19th December, 2007 08:30
Scotland create World Cup surprise
By Jamie MacDonald
Comments (0)
Print Article
The Scotland World Cup squad under the statue of Jesus Christ in Rio in Brazil.
IT TOOK the best teams on the planet to stop Alloa’s Alan Oliver and his Scottish team mates at the Cerebral Palsy World Cup.
Alan (20) was part of the Scottish team that travelled to Rio last month to take part in the tournament and the Scots boys did themselves proud by finishing sixth overall.
Before the 18-day tournament Scotland were seeded bottom of the 16 qualifiers and the team set off determined to prove they were being underestimated.
Alan said, “We did really well and we’re quite happy with how the tournament went.
“It was a fantastic experience for me and it was really good just to be in that environment.”
In the first round the Scots qualified from a group that included Argentina, China and Russia.
Alan said, “We had a great start beating Argentina, and we showed we had something to give. We got a draw with China – although we should have won that too.
“Russia were a full-time paralympic team and they were the overall winners. They were miles ahead of everyone else and they beat us 6-0.”
Alan was left-back in the team that played defensively and hit their opponents on the counter-attack.
He said, “Other teams were all out attack and we tried to attack them on the break – it was a shame our shooting was pretty poor.”
In the play-offs, another full-time team, Iran, beat the Scots but a victory over Republic of Ireland, before losing to Holland, left Alan happy with sixth place overall.
It wasn’t all hard work in the sun for the Scottish team, however, especially with the famous Copacabana beach just a stone’s throw from the team’s hotel.
Alan said, “We were just 30 seconds away from the beach but were under strict warning not to spend too long there.
“In the last two days when we had free time we all went down to the Copacabana and got completely sunburnt – so the boss probably had a good point.
“We also went to watch Flamengo versus Santos at the Maracana – Brazil’s national stadium. There were 89,000 people there and the atmosphere was electric.”
With the World Cup now a thing of the past Alan is in line for more international recognition.
Having previously played for Scotland at the Four Nations Disabled Badminton Championships, he has been selected to join the Scottish team once again for the Badminton European Championships.
Del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Reddit
Stumbleupon
Alloa pick up first away point