What started out as any other Sunday afternoon in January for a group of Imperial College students quickly turned into a gripping, nail-biting occasion and a first in Imperial College Wolverines dodge ball history, following a string of outstanding performances at the ‘Essex Open Dodgeball Tournament’.
Wolverines I kicked off the tournament by securing a confident 3-2 victory against the ‘Repham Raiders’, a division one team and therefore a challenging and worthy opponent. They then went on to defeat ‘Winchester Reloaded’ with a phenomenal 5-0 outcome. They completed their qualifying matches with yet another 5-0 victory against the ‘Warwick Freshers’, in spite of a slight numerical mishap with the scoreboards, which didn’t go unnoticed by the team and spectators.
This led them to be top of their group and it quickly dawned upon them that they would be pitted against both of Warwick’s notoriously skilled teams in the semi-finals, who themselves joked that the Wolverines would ‘have fun in the 5th and 6th place play-offs’.
This, however, did not deter them and following a spectacular 4-1 victory against the Warwick II’s in the semi-finals the team’s confidence went from strength to strength.
This on its own was not enough to secure a place for them in the final – they would need to beat the highly skilled Warwick I’s to achieve this, a difficult feat given that the Warwick I’s have unrelentingly taken home gold medals over the past year. The match started off with a win to Warwick, however this did not stop the Wolverines, who managed to pull back a win making the score one all. Warwick then hit back fiercely, winning yet another game. The Wolverines fought back, with remarkable skill and notable performances from both Alan Soltani and Scott Esnouf, and went on to win another 2 consecutive games making the final score an incredible 3-2 to Imperial, securing their place in the final against the ‘Bedfordshire Bulls’.
The final proved to be just as thrilling as the previous matches with a 4-2 outcome to the ‘Bedfordshire Bulls’ and the Imperial Wolverines I’s were delighted to come runner-up to the undefeated team, taking home their first ever silver medals – a particularly proud moment for Adam Cutmore, Club Chair, who has previously played in 17 tournaments all over the country. Edmund Teo was given the honor of ‘man-of-the-match’ following some unbelievably skilled game play as he was practically unhittable throughout the duration of the tournament.
The Imperial Wolverine’s II team also displayed some strong performances in their games with some absolutely stunning catches from ‘man-of-the-match’ Luke Barron and strong leadership from team captain Will Robinson.
Such strong and promising performances from the Imperial Wolverines teams in this particular tournament highlights just how the far the team have come and the potential that they have to go even further (as long as they remember how to start the minibus engine).
