Tuesday's team captain talk.

Shanghai Cosmos were established Sept 2008 by James Boyle from a group of guys who had played football socially for 2 years, who now wanted to take their football/drinking more seriously and take on some competitive teams. The first task was to find a bar willing the sponsor the team and give us some start up funds for equipment, kits, league registration, and beer; lucky for us most team members are well known in the shanghai bars. Big Bamboo and Bacardi won the race for our sponsorship and now the next step was to get training venue and try and get semi fit for our first game in the SIFL.

Training from Coach Boyle is at Huo-Che-Tou Stadium on Wednesday evenings, a majority of the squad isn’t from footballing backgrounds but has always been willing to learn and further their ability in training which has achieved some excellent results, with the Cosmos defense being the toughest in the league, only conceding 10 goals in the 13 league fixtures. Along with this miserly defence Jordan Campbell has been on top form, the ginger marksman scoring 13 goals in his 8 games played.

After some good early results in the league, the main task was to keep our players from going out on Friday night so we could continue our good form. Shanghai Cosmos registered 30 players at the start of the season, and due to players leaving Shanghai before Christmas we dropped down to 18-19 players, but luckily for us we have finally got some new recruits on board, but are always looking for more.

The key for promotion from division 1 seems to be keeping a squad together and hoping not too many players are away on business on the same weekend. As in the 14 games as a club we have never been able to keep the same starting eleven in consecutive Saturdays.

With a handful of game left in the season, Shanghai Cosmos currently stand 2nd in the league with Voodoo and Crown ReUnited a close 3rd and 4th respectively. It will be crucial to get results in the final games against the teams around us and hope a few results go in our favour, for us to achieve the first objective; Promotion!

Article submitted by James Boyle, founder, captain, player of the Cosmos FC.

Cosmos currently sit top of the SIFL Division One and looking certain for promotion to the Premier league this season, not bad for a first year team in the SIFL.