I have to own up to something that I'm not particularly proud of because it's an opinion I have harboured for some time concerning the level of ability our average player could perform at.
I had a pretty low opinion as you may have guessed which maybe pis$ed some people off but I ain't really gonna blow smoke up anyone's ass just to stop them being pis$ed with me.
Maybe some of those people might have had a grain of justification, maybe not, but the level of play exampled by our teams wasn't exactly awe inspiring but that wasn't altogether our fault because the recession had its wicked way with lots of our teams.
The recession has basically hewn some of our teams in half with lots of guys unable to afford any further inclusion in the sport we all love.
Along with a cyclic recession paintball itself was trying to recover from, this latest overall economic recession bit deep into our reservoir of players leaving few teams unaffected.
The effect of all this was to drastically redraw the learning curve all our teams and players were sitting on prior to these problems.
Our average level of play began to dip and I had been of the opinion the average UK team [teams not attending the Millennium] played host to average players getting more average by the month.
At the Fed Cup this weekend, I watched more games than I've done for a long time and I'm really pleased I did because I'm not sure whether or not I was witness to a change in our playing fortunes or something equally impressive is afoot, as to what that is, fuhk knows?
Either way, I'm not really bothered because it means things are looking up for UK ball but I'd better flesh out what I'm talking about here otherwise I could be accused of talking bollocks.
If I think about it, teams don't ever really impress me, players do, and I have always believed that if you have great players, you can achieve great teams ... but not always I know.
A lot of bollocks is talked about teamwork but I know this much, get good technical players around you and teamwork will become an emergent property of that overall technical expertise.
I proved it with Nexus and I could easily prove it again [but I'm not going to] because the theory is sound and I understand all of that theory's components and interrelationships.
In fact, I'd venture it's not so much theoretical now as proven ... the original Nexus proved the theory and those guys did it in the best possible way, they went on on the field of play and did it, time and again.
At the weekend I watched quite a few XBall games and a few five-mans and I musta seen about ten or so players, all of whom could be classed as 'nobodys' but boy, could those guys play.
I better quickly clarify my use of the word 'nobodys' because I meant no disrespect whatsoever, I merely meant to classify the set of individuals I had seen and I wanted to make the point that none of them were known players such as some of the so-called stars on show.
I realise there were no real stars on show like Ollie Lang or Tommy Pemberton but there were certainly players there who might think they were if you know what I mean.
It sems these days, all you gotta do is be on a pro-team roster and some of these guys feel as though they're Ollie Lang as you seem them stru thru the ranks of amateurs and novices .. it's quite sad really.
And so what does this mean?
In its most basic sense I am saying there were players on show at the Fed Cup, that if I had a mind, I could most certainly choose for a UK super team, and those guys would make it as top, top gunners ... this is no BS, I know what good players look like within 30 secs of watching them and I saw a couple of handfuls of them.
The make up of teams in terms of personal skill-sets has changed slightly since when I created Nexus with a greater emphasis being placed on gun-running but the essence of the game is still very much the same, you just go about winning in a slightly different manner.
I suppose the weekend for all its success meant little to me as a paintball purist until I realised exactly what we had in our player-larder and I just hope these little rays of sunshine are still around come the recovery.
If anybody had a mind, they could most certainly recruit enough players to put together at least two top teams if they knew what they were doing and could secure sufficient funds.
Now before anybody gets the wrong idea about why I may have posted this, or before anyone accuses me of anything; I'm 100%, abso-fackin-lutely not ever gonna put a team together and coach again ... never... well not unless someone waves a hundred thousand quid in front of me anyway.
The whole point of this post was to flag up and to acknowledge we have class players dotted around the country just waiting to be plucked ... and it made me feel really enthused to realise we could still home-grow some of these potential superstars.
Well done guys ....whoever you are
I had a pretty low opinion as you may have guessed which maybe pis$ed some people off but I ain't really gonna blow smoke up anyone's ass just to stop them being pis$ed with me.
Maybe some of those people might have had a grain of justification, maybe not, but the level of play exampled by our teams wasn't exactly awe inspiring but that wasn't altogether our fault because the recession had its wicked way with lots of our teams.
The recession has basically hewn some of our teams in half with lots of guys unable to afford any further inclusion in the sport we all love.
Along with a cyclic recession paintball itself was trying to recover from, this latest overall economic recession bit deep into our reservoir of players leaving few teams unaffected.
The effect of all this was to drastically redraw the learning curve all our teams and players were sitting on prior to these problems.
Our average level of play began to dip and I had been of the opinion the average UK team [teams not attending the Millennium] played host to average players getting more average by the month.
At the Fed Cup this weekend, I watched more games than I've done for a long time and I'm really pleased I did because I'm not sure whether or not I was witness to a change in our playing fortunes or something equally impressive is afoot, as to what that is, fuhk knows?
Either way, I'm not really bothered because it means things are looking up for UK ball but I'd better flesh out what I'm talking about here otherwise I could be accused of talking bollocks.
If I think about it, teams don't ever really impress me, players do, and I have always believed that if you have great players, you can achieve great teams ... but not always I know.
A lot of bollocks is talked about teamwork but I know this much, get good technical players around you and teamwork will become an emergent property of that overall technical expertise.
I proved it with Nexus and I could easily prove it again [but I'm not going to] because the theory is sound and I understand all of that theory's components and interrelationships.
In fact, I'd venture it's not so much theoretical now as proven ... the original Nexus proved the theory and those guys did it in the best possible way, they went on on the field of play and did it, time and again.
At the weekend I watched quite a few XBall games and a few five-mans and I musta seen about ten or so players, all of whom could be classed as 'nobodys' but boy, could those guys play.
I better quickly clarify my use of the word 'nobodys' because I meant no disrespect whatsoever, I merely meant to classify the set of individuals I had seen and I wanted to make the point that none of them were known players such as some of the so-called stars on show.
I realise there were no real stars on show like Ollie Lang or Tommy Pemberton but there were certainly players there who might think they were if you know what I mean.
It sems these days, all you gotta do is be on a pro-team roster and some of these guys feel as though they're Ollie Lang as you seem them stru thru the ranks of amateurs and novices .. it's quite sad really.
And so what does this mean?
In its most basic sense I am saying there were players on show at the Fed Cup, that if I had a mind, I could most certainly choose for a UK super team, and those guys would make it as top, top gunners ... this is no BS, I know what good players look like within 30 secs of watching them and I saw a couple of handfuls of them.
The make up of teams in terms of personal skill-sets has changed slightly since when I created Nexus with a greater emphasis being placed on gun-running but the essence of the game is still very much the same, you just go about winning in a slightly different manner.
I suppose the weekend for all its success meant little to me as a paintball purist until I realised exactly what we had in our player-larder and I just hope these little rays of sunshine are still around come the recovery.
If anybody had a mind, they could most certainly recruit enough players to put together at least two top teams if they knew what they were doing and could secure sufficient funds.
Now before anybody gets the wrong idea about why I may have posted this, or before anyone accuses me of anything; I'm 100%, abso-fackin-lutely not ever gonna put a team together and coach again ... never... well not unless someone waves a hundred thousand quid in front of me anyway.
The whole point of this post was to flag up and to acknowledge we have class players dotted around the country just waiting to be plucked ... and it made me feel really enthused to realise we could still home-grow some of these potential superstars.
Well done guys ....whoever you are
