CONTEST; TELL US ABOUT YOUR FAVOURITE FOOTBALL MEMOMORY

As a football fan and lover, i have had so many amazing football memories from playing, watching and supporting my favorite team FC Barcelona. But there is one particular  memory that  always brings a smile to my face and sends my blood rushing anytime I remember it.

It was in 2015 while I was in secondary school and I was still a pretty good footballer unlike now, my school organized an intra school football tournament made up of eight teams with 20 players each. i found myself in a team called ARINZE FC and with the calibre of players in my team we had a very good chance of winning the tournament. We were put in two groups with the first two teams in each group progressing to the semi finals. No surprise we topped our group in style and became the favorites to some to win the tournament, but to some the favorites were ONUMA FC. they had also topped their group and were looking so fierce. ARINZE FC and ONUMA FC quickly became like BARCELONA and REAL MADRID, amassing fan bases and supporters across the school who often would get into arguments about who were the better side and who was going to win the tournament.
As expected we made it pass the semi finals although we were made to work hard by our opponents while ONUMA FC made it through to the final with sublime ease thumping their opponents 5 nil in the semis. As the final drew near, there were a lot of punditry on who was going to win the tournament. the arguments and discussions brought up mixed feelings in me, on one hand I was anxious almost as if it was the champions league final and on the other i felt flattered that there was all this fuss about us as if we were professional footballers, maybe this is how Messi and Ronaldo feel.
Then came the day and I can still remember it was on a Sunday, all I could think about was the match even as we went to sermon all I prayed for was a win. As the time drew near I became more and more anxious, i had never felt this nervous about playing football. The match was scheduled to kick off at 4.00 pm and by 3.45 pm we were already kitted up ready to walk out on the pitch in two straight lines. As were marched out, I could hear my heart beat even with the shouts and cheers from the spectators and it felt like I was walking out on the grounds of the Wembley stadium or the camp nou. At exactly 4.00 pm we kicked off with ONUMA FC with the ball and as we played i could feel myself becoming less nervous and more confident.
The final match was as good as everybody had hoped for, if not better with the two teams putting up such exhilarating
performances in fact I can say I played one of my best games that day. The first half ended goalless with the two teams creating a lot of chances. The second half began on a high note with the two teams pushing their attack thereby making the game end to end. In the 60th minute ONUMA FC scored a brilliant set piece and half the school went mad. After the goal it was as if we had gone into gear two and we started to dominate the game and came close to equalizing a few times but was denied by their goalkeeper. As time went we played better with a lot more confidence as our supporters cheered us on.
On the 79th minute, GOALLLL!!! could be heard echoing from the school pitch, ONUMA FC had scored a second goal from a blistering counter attack with just around ten minutes left. At this point the trophy was surely theirs but ironically we kept pushing like it was us who scored and was looking for the winner and in the 83rd minute we pulled one back and once again there was momentum.
We kept pushing till stoppage time and with a hail mary I put the ball in the box from the wings and in an extra ordinary turn of events our striker was fouled in the box, penalty. The pitch went mad with noise with some disagreeing with the decision while some concurred. And with the last kick of the game we had the chance to level the game and send it to extra time. Our striker stepped up and with the last kick missed, the keeper putting it out for a corner kick. We were devastated and had already resigned to our defeat. The corner was taken and with a series of deflections the ball found itself in the net, GOALLLL, we had leveled the game from almost nothing.
The game went to penalties with none of the teams being able to win it in extra time. ONUMA took their first spot kick and missed and we scored. they missed their second and we scored ours, we were two goals ahead on the night and we could finally see ourselves winning the trophy but that vision blurred almost immediately after we missed our next two spot kicks and they scored theirs, we were level again. The last kick, the ONUMA player stepped up and beat our goalkeeper putting the ball in the bottom left corner, they were ahead but all we had to do was score to continue, not a problem because our last kicker was our best player and possibly the best player in the tournament. He stepped up and with confidence kicked the ball over the bar!! How did that happen, we were all devastated but mostly shocked, how did he miss, he was our best player, after all the drama of the night we had lost but funny enough I didnt feel like we had lost. We had put on amazing performance, a pulse ripping display that everyone enjoyed.
Till this day anytime I remeber it, I feel the same tension and excitement I felt then. Yeah we lost but we fought and believed till the end. This is my favorite football memory
special thanks to @njaywan for this opportunity