Please help us as now that (we think) Willey is the #1 ranked player
in the ASA, that's all we hear! Willey now refers to himself as ASA
#1. Please help us by having a tournament so that he isn't #1
anymore!

The SoCal Subbuteo Club hosted the 1st ASA Open of the season. And
it was a bit of a disappointment as only 4 showed up to play. It
was also a disappointment for the host, Wayne Smith, the clear
favorite. But for Greg Willey, it was awesome.

His first game was a 0:0 tie with James Partipilo on a van den Berg
pitch-by far the slower of the two pitches used during the
tournament. But with that, Willey got the speed of the pitch down.
That would be key in his next game. Wayne played his first game on
the faster pitch and had no trouble with Kevin Nieman, winning 2:0.
Wayne played Willey on the slow pitch in the second game and the
slow pitch killed Wayne. He consistently fell short on easy flicks,
three times just trying to get his figure over either a touch line
or goal line to get into position for a missed flick and fell short,
allowing Willey to force throw-ins and a corner kick.

The 1st goal of the game was on a penalty kick. Willey took a shot
which caromed off a defender up in the air and off Wayne's hand.
Since it wasn't clear if his hand was behind the goal line or not,
he called the handball on himself. Willey buried the ball into the
back of the net to make it 1:0. Willey made it 2:0 with about 7
minutes left in the game. Again, Willey buried the shot, this time
roofing it over the keeper. Wayne made it close after Willey's
keeper came out and lost the ball. Willey nearly wiggled out of the
problem by making a perfect defensive flick, but Wayne flicked a
figure 2/3's the width of the field to touch up on the ball, pass it
backwards bouncing it off an attacker, touch up on it again, turn on
it and score. But that was as close as it got.

The other 2nd round match was another 0:0 tie between James and
Kevin. Including league matches, it was their third straight 0:0
tie.

The final matches saw James score his only goal of the tournament
and tie Wayne 1:1. More importantly, Willey won his match 2:0 to
clinch the tournament.

Oh, and yes, Wayne was playing left handed. The good news is that
everyone is getting so good that Wayne will no longer play in
tournaments left handed, the bad news for everyone else is that
Wayne will no longer play in tournaments left handed.

GP W T L PTS GF GA
Willey 3 2 1 0 7 4 1
Smith 3 1 1 1 4 4 3
James 3 0 3 0 3 1 1
Kevin 3 0 1 2 1 0 4

Wayne 2 Kevin 0
Willey 0 James 0
James 0 Kevin 0
Willey 2 Wayne 1
Willey 2 Kevin 0
Wayne 1 James 1