Cat Phillips Reports on the her experience at worlds in Vancouver 2008.

My worlds experience began at Sydney airport, when the two junior teams were presented with our uniforms. We then travelled together to Vancouver, where we started our pre-tour, which consisted of two practice games against high schools in Seattle and lots of training. At the end of our first week overseas we were fully settled in and ready to begin the tournament.

Our first game was against Canada, the number 2 seed, and we came into it as the underdog, not expected to put up much of a fight. However, we came out hard and managed to come away with an inspiring win, showing the world we were here for real. In the first round of pool games, we then went on to play Great Britain, Finland, Japan, Colombia and the USA. These first few games really showed everyone who we were, as we became the first Australian team to beat the USA at a world championship event, and came out of the first pool round ranked 3rd, after Japan and Colombia.

As we were still learning how to play together as a team, we went into the second pool round wanting to learn about the other teams and work out tactics we could use in the finals. We played both Japan and Colombia again, and although we didn’t beat them, we found we could really take it to the Colombian girls, and they were by no means unbeatable. Because of this, we were very happy to be placed in a semi final against Colombia, although I think we were all scared as well, being the first Australian team at the tournament through to a semi.

Our semi final was the showcase game for the day, so it was played on field 1, late in the afternoon, with most teams coming to watch, and even being commentated on. This was by far the biggest game we had played, and it was so great to have the support of all the other Aussie teams, especially the Thunder guys cheering us on throughout the whole game. We ended up coming away with the win, after being down 15 - 13, and it showed the grit and Aussie determination that separated us from the other teams. We went on the play in the final against Japan, and although we were beaten, no one felt like we had lost. We were all so happy that we had been given this opportunity to play ultimate at the highest level, and had all learnt so much from the experience.

When we were presented with our silver medals, it was like we had won gold, and winning the Spirit award was more than any of us could have asked for from the tour. It was such a great feeling to know that as well as playing competitive ultimate, we had played within the spirit of the game and had represented our country with pride.