Daily life as we know it has changed hugely in the past year due to coronavirus, wearing masks everywhere we go, and singing to ensure we wash our hands for long enough.
But how have students lives at UEL been affected without any university sport being able to take place?
UEL is known for its state-of-the-art facility, SportsDock a multi-use sports facility including a gym, conditioning centre, and an outdoor 5-a-side pitch.
The gym was famously used by the USA team during the London Olympics back in 2012. But in more recent times due to the pandemic, the SportsDock has been more of a desert than a bustling multi-sport complex.
Athlete’s Thought’s
For student-athletes, it has halted university sport completely, with no games and only a few training sessions happening so far this year.
Irfan Khan, UEL Hockey chairperson stated, “I have started to appreciate everything more. Sometimes, we just need to take a step back and realize what we have and appreciate, and I am just grateful to be part of such a fantastic club at university.”
He continued, “It is a difficult time for everyone in our club, but we stay in contact online a lot. Seen as we cannot even train as a team, we have been working on player development in theatrical knowledge and technical aspects via zoom call as well as having some great quiz nights.”
But despite all the steps taken by teams, it is just not the same. Khan alongside many student-athletes cannot wait to just get back to normal, “I’m just looking forward to being able to get back on the pitch and I’m excited to return to training with my team.”
Affect On Others
Not only does it affect student-athletes, but it affects those of us who write these articles too, the sports journalism students. Finley Chung, a Sports Journalism 3rd-year student at UEL explained how it has affected him:
“The lack of sport has affected me quite a bit to be honest, towards the end of my second year I was a part of the UEL media team for UEL Sports which allowed me to do some live commentary on UEL sport at SportsDock along with several articles for Rising East.”
He spoke about some of the opportunity’s sports journalism students get to take up through UEL sport, “I got to go to the BUCS EIS Indoor Championships in Sheffield last year and that was a really good thing for not only my confidence but my contacts book, as that allowed me to build a rapport with Jacob [Hood] and Sian [Trimble-Davies] over at SportsDock.”
But with no competitive sport taking place none of these opportunities are available.
Chung continued, “We have a lack of in-person press conferences and no sports on at SportsDock to write about. Usually, on a Wednesday, SportsDock is busy with players and staff always wanting to give their input and be heard.”
For now, we are in such unprecedented times that the return of university sport is always at risk. Currently, UEL sports teams are expected to return to training in early January but when it comes to competitive games against other universities the future is unknown and there is currently no date set by BUCS.
Here’s hoping that sporting life within UEL will soon return to how we know and love it.
