This year was the 34th Oshwal Sports Day. There was a new venue, new timetable and some pleasant surprises in results too! West Area were captained by Kyle Bimal Shah and our vice-captain was Niraj Vijay Shah. Whilst supported by a number of volunteers to ensure we were ready, these guys ensured our area was well prepared, organised and well represented for the 3-day event – fantastic effort from them both!
Despite some challenging through injury and unavailability we managed to enter the majority of team and individual events with a combination of West area and some borrowed players from the wider Oshwal community. We would like to thank everyone for their participation, and also the parents and other area reps for helping us make the teams and enabling us to compete.
This year we didn’t just participate but we managed to shock the other areas and across all events we picked up points and wins which many wouldn’t have given us beforehand since we were the underdogs. The team spirit, commitment, dedication and never say die attitude helped us to come 2nd overall, only behind North West – not bad for an area without full teams. Some stand out performances would be the men’s and ladies team both winning football, ladies tactically dominating ladies basketball, over 35s dodgeball team playing together for the first time and winning overall, our U12s coming second in dodgeball and our 10-14 benchball team coming 2nd and in the process beating North West with a last second goal!
The summary of our performances are:
1st places: Men’s football, Ladies football, Ladies Basketball, O35 Dodgeball, Mens Doubles Darts, 14-18 Girls Backstroke and Breaststroke, O50 Men’s Breaststroke
2nd places: U12 Dodgeball, Chokri, 10-14 Benchball, Netball, 19-35 Men’s Backstroke and Breaststroke
3rd places: Boccia, U9 girls swimming (all 3 strokes), 19-35 Men’s Fresstyle
Other events which we participated but this year didn’t place in the top 3 are: Men’s Basketball, U12 Football, U16 Football, Mixed Circuit Training, Volleyball, Men’s Singles Darts, Ladies Singles Darts, Ladies Doubles Darts, Mixed Doubles Darts, 10-11 boys Swimming.
Our youths also stepped and volunteered to referee a large number of games including all Basketball, Dodgeball and Benchball games; a large number of Football matches and some Netball matches too. They were on hand to help coach and provide assistance to the organisers wherever required over the 3 days too so thank you all.
A great achievement and we once again thank all our participants and supporters for their herculean effort in surpassing all expectations and coming 2nd overall from the 8 participating areas. Additionally, we were the joint winners of the overall Dodgeball floating trophy too. Finally, whilst Sports Day is a about the areas competing against one another, there are awards for those individuals who have stood out and above the rest. This year we are proud to celebrate Miral Mahesh Shah winning the Sportsman of the year award winning well deserving of this prize for his contributions and hard work year as well as in the past!
For more photo’s of the amazing event please click here
