Not even a typhoon could put a dampener on the 25th anniversary celebrations of expat soccer club Red Lions FC.
A special tournament, months in the planning, looked in grave danger when the original venue was rendered unusable after Typhoon Senlaku did its worst. However, frantic last minute efforts saved the day and the sun shone on Taipei’s Dajia Riverside Park on Sunday as eight sides battled it out in two groups of four.
Club chairman Nick Alexander puts the Lions’ unusual longevity down to team spirit.
“It’s perhaps an exaggeration but it is a bit like a family,” Alexander, an English teacher at the British Council says. “We go out for a drink after games and get together at weekends, even when we don’t have games.”
Soccer proved a good way for Alexander to find his feet in Taiwan when he arrived here in 1996.
“When you first get here you don’t know the situation but through football you can find people who can help out with finding jobs and so on. People helped each other a lot,” Alexander says.
Another stalwart, Paddy O’Sullivan, recalls one of the club’s finest hours.
“We went on a tour of Cambodia and had arranged to play a friendly game at the national stadium,” the 18-year club veteran explains. “We got a hell of a shock when we arrived to find it full of spectators with armed soldiers ringing the touchline.”
The Lions ended up playing the Cambodian army side, putting up a good fight before going down 1-0.
“We hit the post in the last minute, which was probably just as well, as the crowd were pretty lively,” O’Sullivan says.
Alas, there was no fairytale victory for the Lions on Sunday, despite fielding two teams, one of which was a veterans lineup including former players who traveled from as far afield as Hong Kong, China, Singapore and even the UK to take part.
Both sides finished third in their respective groups, which meant the current Red Lions and the veterans met each other in a play-off clash.
Perhaps the hectic schedule of four games in one day had taken its toll, or maybe it was the after-effects of Saturday night’s pub crawl around old haunts kicking in, but the Lions sides decided not to play the game and had a penalty shoot-out instead.
The veterans called on all their experience to put the youngsters in their place and earn victory, perhaps claiming bragging rights for the next 25 years.
To find out more about the Lions, visit www.redlionsfc.org.
A Chinese freighter that allegedly snapped an undersea cable linking Taiwan proper to Penghu County is suspected of being owned by a Chinese state-run company and had docked at the ports of Kaohsiung and Keelung for three months using different names. On Tuesday last week, the Togo-flagged freighter Hong Tai 58 (宏泰58號) and its Chinese crew were detained after the Taipei-Penghu No. 3 submarine cable was severed. When the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) first attempted to detain the ship on grounds of possible sabotage, its crew said the ship’s name was Hong Tai 168, although the Automatic Identification System (AIS)
An Akizuki-class destroyer last month made the first-ever solo transit of a Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force ship through the Taiwan Strait, Japanese government officials with knowledge of the matter said yesterday. The JS Akizuki carried out a north-to-south transit through the Taiwan Strait on Feb. 5 as it sailed to the South China Sea to participate in a joint exercise with US, Australian and Philippine forces that day. The Japanese destroyer JS Sazanami in September last year made the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force’s first-ever transit through the Taiwan Strait, but it was joined by vessels from New Zealand and Australia,
CHANGE OF MIND: The Chinese crew at first showed a willingness to cooperate, but later regretted that when the ship arrived at the port and refused to enter Togolese Republic-registered Chinese freighter Hong Tai (宏泰號) and its crew have been detained on suspicion of deliberately damaging a submarine cable connecting Taiwan proper and Penghu County, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement yesterday. The case would be subject to a “national security-level investigation” by the Tainan District Prosecutors’ Office, it added. The administration said that it had been monitoring the ship since 7:10pm on Saturday when it appeared to be loitering in waters about 6 nautical miles (11km) northwest of Tainan’s Chiang Chun Fishing Port, adding that the ship’s location was about 0.5 nautical miles north of the No.
SECURITY: The purpose for giving Hong Kong and Macau residents more lenient paths to permanent residency no longer applies due to China’s policies, a source said The government is considering removing an optional path to citizenship for residents from Hong Kong and Macau, and lengthening the terms for permanent residence eligibility, a source said yesterday. In a bid to prevent the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from infiltrating Taiwan through immigration from Hong Kong and Macau, the government could amend immigration laws for residents of the territories who currently receive preferential treatment, an official familiar with the matter speaking on condition of anonymity said. The move was part of “national security-related legislative reform,” they added. Under the amendments, arrivals from the Chinese territories would have to reside in Taiwan for
RSS