Conflict Personal Essay

Conflict Essay

It was the tennis state championship final and he winner would go on to play in the national championships and if we won this match we would have gone through. My opponent and I had gone undefeated to this point and the winner would go through. I was very nervous before the game, I hadn’t seen him play yet and I didn’t know what to expect. We walked on the court and started warming up and I was surprised, he was not as good as I thought he was going to be. I won the toss and I served.

I won the first game comfortably and also the second game and he was getting frustrated. Then I served the ball that clearly hit the line and it aced him, then he called it out. I asked him if he was sure that it was out, he said yes. I gave him the benefit of the doubt and did not argue any further. But then again later in the game I hit a winner that was clearly in which he called it out and he won that game from that. I could not see exactly where it landed so I could not argue with his call. Then he won the next game aswell. He kept making bad calls and he won the next 3 games so that left the scores at 5 games to 2 games his way and I was getting frustrated at him cheating, but I decided to forget about and just do my best to win this match playing fairly. A match that you have won fairly is much better than winning if you have cheated to do so.

In this game it was his serve and I was up 15-40, he was getting very angry. He served the ball and I smashed it back at him and won the game. I was beginning to make my comeback and I won the next game aswell. This meant the scores were 4 games to 5 games in his favour. The first point I hit the ball and he missed it and I had started to celebrate when he called it out, I was sure that it landed in, so I questioned him and he insisted that it landed out. I was not allowed to argue with his call. I was disappointed that he thought he had to cheat to win a game of tennis. I just wanted to play a fair game of tennis. I did comeback and win the game and the one after that despite some more of his attempts to cheat. This left the scores at 6 games to 5 games with me in the lead. All I needed to do was win just one more game and I would go through and play in the national championships.

The scores of this game was deuce, then I won the next point and it was my advantage and match point. I felt the adrenalin rush through my body, he served the ball and I saw it falling short so I ran forward to get to the ball as quickly as I could and I just reached the ball and played a beautiful shot which he could not return, I threw my fist up in the air to celebrate the victory. But my celebrations were cut short when he claimed that I did not get the ball before it bounced a second time which meant he won the point he then went on to win the game. Which meant the scores were 6 games to 6 games and we had to play a tiebreak game to determine the winner. The first person to 7 points would win. Every time one of us scored a point the other would win the next one, the scores of the tiebreak game were 5 to 5 and then he won the next point. Which meant he had to win this point to win the match. He served the ball, which bounced in the middle of the service square and aced him. He had won the match. It wasn’t a good feeling knowing that he had to cheat to win the match. I do not know why people believe that they have to cheat in a game jut to win; it is not all about winning. It is about having fun, playing fairly and trying your best. I went on to shake his hand at the end of the match knowing I had done the right thing. I was more disappointed that he needed to cheat to win the match than I was losing the match.