Explicit Storms into '16
Sydney Explicit storms into 2016
The core of Explicit consisting of Mick Jones, Steve Brown, Mitch Hackett, Josh Bailey and myself came into 2016 after losing a few players. In the previous year we had a guest player who played each event with us, Marcello Margott who helped bring his knowledge to the team. After the 2015 season, the team had finished 3rd at every event, coming so close each time. But close does not matter in paintball.
Adding to the Roster in 2016, we had picked up Marley Wright from Western Australia who is a beast on the field. No longer did the team have a pro player or import as they are referred to down under with the team. Practices for the first event in the Super 7 Paintball Series started 5 weeks out. With the first event being the Dye Asia Cup we really wanted to bring our A game and make it to the top of the podium. During these practices, the team was playing well together and felt like everything was falling into place and gelling for the start of a good year.
Round 1 came. The Super 7’s Dye Asia Cup. Our first match of the year the team would play would be against another local team that has a record for being one of the top teams in the Super 7’s and the country of Australia, Sydney SWAT. The match was going both ways with each team winning points and ended in a tie 3-3. Which for the team was a good start as normally we start off a bit flat and then get the wheel going. So a tie to SWAT was ok as it set a good tone for the event.
Second match of the event was against a new team to the Pro division Frequency. Explicit welcomed them into the Pro division with a shutout and won 3-0, keeping the pace going from our previous match and heads up.
Third match of the day was against our long time rivals and fellow Dye sponsored team, nVs. This was probably one of our toughest matches of the weekend in the prelims. Neither team was giving away anything and both wanted to beat each other. With only 20 seconds left in the game one of the nVs players made a great move down the doritos to bunker out our last player and hit the buzzer to end the match 2-3. Still a respectable score and another close match against one of the top teams. The only thing which hurt from the match was our last player who had gotten bunkered, and that just so happened to be me! Thanks Karl…
Fourth match of the prelims was against another newer team to the Pro division, Phoenix FC. We had great control over the entire match and within a few minutes the match ended 4-0 win. This would help keep the team in a good standing on the leader board to make the finals.
The teams’ fifth and final prelim game for Saturday was against NZ Expendables from New Zealand. They gave us a great game and unfortunately for us also ended in a tie 2-2. Helpful hint to all who are reading this, normally you’d go and annihilate the last guy alive on the other team before the timer runs out.
Sunday arrives and we play our sixth match against HK Reaper Crew. The game finished out yet another draw 3-3.
Each match that ended in a tie was not helping the team out for the end goal of making it to the finals. Explicit had to come out strong and win our last prelim game against our long time friends and Super 7’s team East Side Raw. Both teams played brilliantly, but luckily for us we ended with the win 5-2.
The last win was enough to put us in the top 4 and a chance to still make the finals and win the event.
Going into the Semi finals we were matched up against Sydney SWAT who we had tied in the first match of the event. This was a controversial match, which in the end did not go our way. We lost this match 1-3 with the game going to time, but not after Mitch and myself doing an awesome run through practically annihilating their team. If there was one way I wanted to lose a game, it was going all out like that. I don’t think I’ve ever had that much fun losing a match.
However, due to this loss we would be playing in the finals but for third and fourth place, a position that this team knows all too well. No one likes to be in these games but you still want to go out and fight, ending the event with a win. With the team feeling confident, we were up against East Side Raw, who we had just recently beaten in our last prelim game 5-2 to make it into the top 4. Things did not go our way in this match and we copped penalty after penalty from one referee on the same player over and over again. Our heads had gotten out of the game and before we knew it the match was over 1-4 with East Side Raw beating us and handing us a fourth place finish.
So we ended up finishing 4th for our first event of the year. This was not the start to the year we wanted but it is a start and something we plan to build off of. As a team we know what went wrong, and we know what needs to be fixed so that next round we come out better and stronger to bring home the win at the next event. Also next event we will have all of our M2 markers to rock. Our other markers had been held up by our lovely Australia Customs department, leaving only 1 of our players was shooting the M2 (me), which is bloody amazing!
Big thank you to everyone who helped us out over the weekend and a huge thank you to Dye Paintball and Devon Stutz for the support they have continued to show the team as well as Mike Whybrew, John Caruana, Paintball Pete Russell and everyone at Action Paintball.
Aaron McAulay
Sydney Explicit