SFL 2015 (Mens) - Merahan Knights

Into the 10th week of the Singapore Floorball League, in few more weeks’ times it will be the playoff for the league. Every team is trying their best to earn themselves a spot in this year 2015 Singapore Floorball League Playoff. This week we continue our feature in the Men’s Division with Merhan Knights, a team that has great potential to give the league title a fight.

We interviewed their team captain – Jared Goh about Merahan Knights and he shares a little insight of them. Some background of Jared, he is 23 years old and have been playing Floorball for approximately 10 years. He has been playing for Merahan Knights for approximately 7 years, a loyal member of the team. The team was previously coached by Mr Saravanan (National Coach of Singapore Men’s Floorball Team), but Sara has taken a break this year for club coaching thus the team is pretty much self-managing with senior players taking the lead and guiding the younger ones.

Jared shares with us the history of Merahan Knights, “As most of our players studied and graduated from Bukit Merah Secondary School, it is common that the players have known each other for as long as we have picked up floorball. Even the players that were not originally from BMSS, we have known them for a long time. So this team is almost build upon a basis of long term friends. We have consistently achieved a top 4 placing over the past few seasons but occassionly finishing top 8 in the odd year here and there. We have a relatively young team, and apart from our 2 keepers, our oldest player is 24 years old, and youngest is 16years old. We look to continue to keep giving our young players more exponsure so as to ensure the continunity and longevity of our team. Off the court, our team is just like any other group of boys, who just want to have fun. We joke around, crack jokes and leading our normal lives. In terms of floorball, when we train or play, we always do it because we enjoy playing the sport together with one another which has been the case over the years since when we were BMSS as well.”

The new addition for Merahan Knights this season are Tristan, Nicolas, Rupert, Zheng Kang, Rupert, Afiq and Raiyan from Merahan Gunners, Ryan and Jan Brezina from other teams. The players to look out for in Merahan Knights are the older players like Alvin Tan, Mazran, Rashid, Siraaj and Suria. They have the experience and ability to change a game for us. Plus they have also participated in the last 28th Sea Games. Recently we have promoted some young bloods from our brother team – Merahan Gunners and the young blood are Tristan, Nicolas, Rupert and Zheng Kang. Despite their age, they have proved throughout this season that they can contribute well to the team. Lastly, to keep a lookout to our 2 new keepers – Ryan Neo and Jan Brezina. Ryan Neo bring the reliable keeper from Moosemen and our new Czech Republic who has provided the team with his experience in playing in his league at a high level.

Despite our players having work, school and even NS commitments that affect many of us, we try our best to train once a week to ensure our stickwork doesn’t get rusty. Despite our shortcomings, we still give our best to our ability. Last season we achieve top 8, and this season we aim to do better than last year which means at least a top 4 so that there is an improvement. Secondly our goal is to give as much exposure to our younger players who have stepped up from Merahan Gunners. And lastly, is to work slowly to become a more efficient and effective team, with team building and team learning for sustainable growth.

Jared use “Lepak” to describe his team, and he go on to add “We are quite a relax team. Because we play floorball to enjoy.”

In his opinion, teams to look out for in the Mens Divisions are Black Wondersticks, Innebandy, NUS Nemsis and Victoria School. He added, “The usuals aare Black Wondersticks and Innebandy, but I think NUS Nemsis and Victoria Schools are improving very quickly.”

Stay tune as we share our interviews with more teams competing in the SFL 2015….