Last sunday was my virgin Singapore Slingers match. I must really apologise to Nicholas. He has been inviting me to Singapore Slingers since couple of seasons ago, but I always can’t make it for the match.

I managed to con/trick/convince Corrine to join me for the match. It is also the first time I meet her in person after several emails exchange. Corrine was a great company. (And sorry for being late on the first “date”. hee hee)

I heard that the turn out for that day is the highest with around 8500 fans at the Singapore Indoor Stadium. There were two matches happening that day. The first match is between San Miguel and Talk ‘N Text. Honestly, it was a boring match. The tempo was slow and there is hardly any actions. The only exciting part was near the end of the match where San Miguel tried some interesting tactics of purposely fouling Text ‘N Text to catch up with Talk ‘N Text. But they received quite some boos from the audience after a while. I guess partly because we are all eager to watch the Singapore Slingers match.

Oh, in case you are interested, final score for San Miguel VS Talk ‘N Text is 80 – 85.

The next match is Singapore Slingers VS Pampanga Buddies (From Philippines). Yes, the match that I’m there for. The match is a lot better than San Miguel VS Talk ‘N Text. The pace is fast with lots of action and couple of fancy moves. Yeah! That is what basketball is supposed to be about. Singapore Slingers clearly has a few advantages over Pampanga Buddies because they have a couple of tall players. Some of the tall players in the Slingers includes Eric Sandrin 206cm, Sam Harris 221cm, Armein Kirkland 204cm, Pathman Matialakan 202cm and Darren Ng 189cm.

But despite being on home ground, the Slingers didn’t really get much home ground advantage. There are more Pampanga Buddies supporters than Singapore Slingers supporters. At some point, the Pampanga Buddies supporters were boo-ing at Singapore Slingers when they score. I guess it will take a while for more Singaporeans to attend the basketball matches. But it’s a good start. I estimate Slingers fans occupying roughly 30% of the stadium. With more publicity, we can expect more Singaporeans attending the Singapore Slingers match in the near future.

Must really thanks Nicholas and Hillary for being such a great host. We were well taken care of with lots of great beer from Brewerkz. Ooo….. Brewerkz beer goes well with Basketball. (Partly because Brewerkz is one of my fave beer too) Nicholas, despite being busy running around the stadium, was kind enough to explain to me some of the players background and stats. He has been doing a great job for Singapore Slingers.

The match start to gets more exciting during the 3rd quarters when Singapore Slingers went on full force attack and pull the score line away. Before we knew it, Singapore Slingers was leading more than 20 points. That’s when we start seeing the fans of Pampanga Buddies leaving the stadium. Final score between Singapore Slingers VS Pampanga Buddies is 100 – 72 with Sam Harris scoring a last minute 3 pointers. (at the request of fans)

After the match, we went to the court to take a few photos with the players. They are REALLY tall. I’m like a dwarf standing among the players even though I’m around 180cm tall.

The next 4 Singapore Slingers match will be out of Singapore. Looking forward to their next match in Singapore.

Thanks to Nicholas & Hillary for the invite. And also thank Corrine for the great company.

Related posts:

1. Date with DK
2. "I Am Legend" Singapore Premiere
3. Welcome to Singapore
4. HTC Touch Diamond launch in Singapore