Posted on September 29, 2013
Today we won the first — and therefore, at this moment, the most important — game of the championship season.
Defeating our prestigious opponent from the capital has always brought us great satisfaction.
Our renewed team released an enormous amount of energy and we won.
But I will not go into the details of the game, because the victory itself is only the starting point of what I experienced after I got home.
Coming Home
I was the last one to arrive home, at around 10 p.m.
As usual, I stepped out of my shoes and slowly walked toward the room where, only a few hours earlier, the entire day had revolved around one question:
How can we win this game?
I could almost still feel the questions trapped inside those walls.
Questions for which I had tried to prepare answers.
I had imagined the possible scenarios and searched for the one that might make everyone happy.
I was just about to sit down for a moment and quietly enjoy the success of the team by myself.
Then I heard the most beautiful sound in the world.
The laughter of my children and my family.
They were joking freely, remembering the events of the evening, talking over one another and reliving the game.
The taste of victory had overwritten everything else.
For that moment, only one thing mattered:
we had won — and we had done it in style.
Something Money Cannot Buy
My sister and her daughter listened with smiles as the boys, eyes shining, each told the same story from a different point of view.
I simply stood in the hallway and listened to them.
I did not want to interrupt.
Because in moments like this, that atmosphere means everything.
My mother noticed me standing there.
She was not surprised when I told her that this was one of the greatest forms of happiness I could imagine.
Even winning the lottery would not be the same.
Because this feeling cannot be bought.
It has to be experienced.
As a player.
As a coach.
As a supporter.
My niece had travelled home from Budapest just for this.
Passing on a Sporting Culture
Our profession — perhaps even our life’s work — is about passing on a sporting culture.
And tonight, I felt that this had succeeded.
Everyone understood what had happened.
For all of us, the evening game had become the highlight of the day and of the weekend.
That value carries us forward.
And it also carries forward those who live the life of our team together with us.
The Moment
These are the moments worth living for.
Moments that must be earned.
And yet they last only briefly.
Almost immediately, attention has to turn toward the next challenge.
Perhaps that is because we are afraid of losing this feeling.
It can become addictive.
But the moment has to be understood.
We only have a chance to understand it if we do not numb ourselves to it.
If we do not sleep through the critical hours.
If we can connect what happened to something deeper — something that strengthens the feeling and engraves it permanently into our memory.
For me, tonight, that was the sound of my family laughing together.
It meant a great deal.
Because after so many years, I felt that I had added one more small piece to our shared history.
I received confirmation from the people who love the same thing we teach every day.
The same thing for which we sacrifice so much.
The same thing for which we prepare together.
Together
Together.
The family and the team.