Musings ... on Sports in ACS

For generations, the prowess of ACS in the schools’ sporting arena is something which ACSians expect and take for granted. Swimming, badminton, tennis, squash, hockey, water polo, cricket, rugby and track and field are games that ACS has excelled in at some time or other. This has been fuelled in part by the unofficial “title” of top secondary boys school in sports that ACS (Independent) has enjoyed over the past years, including this year when it narrowly pipped Hwa Chong Institute to the top spot with 10 B and C Division titles.

However, to many ACSians, that does not compensate for ACS not winning a single Division in the 2008 Schools National Swimming Championships. That we finished 2nd in all 3 divisions was scant comfort. Never before had we not won at least one division in any given year in swimming where success used to be a given. ACS has always been associated with swimming excellence and no other school has ever come close to its dominance in this sport, until now; we once went 40 years of consecutive victories in the C Division! To compound the setback, our perennial rivals RI/RJC took over our usual pole position when they made a clean sweep of all three boys divisions and the girls A.

So what has happened? Has our hard earned tradition of sporting success been well and truly torpedoed? Is winning really that important or meaningful to us? Do we or must we always play to win at all times? Aren’t there other ways in which we can continue to assert ourselves as models of excellence?

Before addressing the above issues, let’s do a preliminary analysis of swimming. Ominous signs were apparent over the past 3 years that our dominance in swimming would come under serious threat as other schools had steadily and surely closed the gap on us. In the recent past, we had sufficient depth and strength of numbers to triumph by securing more minor placings in the final than our rivals. Although we may not win as many events as our competitors, we were able to win in the Division by virtue of having more swimmers in the final. This year, the role was reversed – we actually won more events but could not amass enough points through the minor placings to overhaul our competitors who had more swimmers getting through to the finals. As such, it would be blatantly unfair for us to react as if we did not produce quality swimmers. We did – just not enough of them, unfortunately.

So what can we do to regain our swimming titles? The simplistic answer seems to be to produce more quality swimmers – not just concentrate on the star swimmers who can win gold medals, but also nurture those good enough to get through to the final. How can this be done? The schools’ swimming scene today is somewhat different from the earlier days, when most swimmers trained under the school. Nowadays, they tend to train at various clubs under various coaches. The onus would be on the schools to keep tabs on the training and progress of its swimmers scattered over different locations. This makes talent spotting more difficult but essential if we are to reverse the tide.

In the past, ACS (Primary) and ACS (Junior) provided the bulk of the top school swimmers, feeding most of them into our secondary schools. Now, talented swimmers come from many other primary schools. In addition, not all our top swimmers from our feeder schools go on to do their secondary education in ACS. Can more effort be expended to ensure that our secondary schools identify them early and incentivise them to continue in ACS? In the past, it might well have been a given that they will continue on in ACS. Sadly, in today’s environment, other schools are more than happy to lay out the red carpet for them and if we do not do likewise (and maybe even more), we may lose them. Talent acquisition is a real challenge – in the working world as in schools.

ACS has without doubt produced the largest number of national swimmers in Singapore compared to any other school. Can these ex-ACSians and national champions be harnessed to lend their wisdom, experience and coaching talents to help us regain our premier position? I certainly hope so. But even with the best of intentions and passion for our alma mater, without proper co-ordination, facilitation and organization by the schools, it would be difficult to achieve much.

For that, perhaps we can spare a thought for a more successful (at least in recent times) game like rugby. For 2008, ACS (Independent) achieved the grand slam by winning the A, B and C Divisions in rugby. This is the sixth grand slam won by the ACS family, with the previous 5 being a collaboration between ACS (Independent) and ACJC. Here, ex-players and other old boys have banded to help out in coaching, and together with parents and the strong support from all 6 ACS schools, positioned ACS in the forefront of schools rugby. In 2006, when the concept of ONE ACS was first mooted by Dr Ang Peng Tiam, then President of the ACSOBA, it was rugby that took the first tentative steps towards realizing this vision by forming a combined ONE ACS rugby team comprising players from ACS (Independent), ACS (Barker Road), ACJC and ACS International to play a series of friendly games in Bangkok. Of course more can and needs to be done if rugby is to continue to be a success story. But one thing is for sure – for this to happen, all must work together with one focus – to groom our students to be the best that they can be, to be useful, contributing citizens, imbued with the right values, with a passion for one another and for the school.

Finally – is winning that important for ACS? I believe that if we play, we should play to win. However, we should NOT be aiming to win at all cost. That is crass and not in keeping with our Methodist heritage. How we win or lose defines our mettle and our upbringing. The world at large seems to suggest that the ends justify the means. I sincerely hope that sports in ACS do not plummet into this abyss. To recall what Mr Lee Hah Ing, ex-principal of ACS used to say – “the “A” in ACS stands for academic excellence, the “C” stands for character and “S” stands for service and sports”.

Success in sports is not the be all and end all for ACSians. It is part of what makes us uniquely ACSians and while we should always strive to win in sports, let’s be more circumspect and acknowledge that there is much to achieve in other areas as well.