[patrickrd]

Sorry for not updating last night, but I did not obtain access to a computer before we left for the day.

The news is that we are eliminated. Yesterday, we played the Canucks, and needed to win to advance. The game was actually very competitive, we had quite a few shots on goal and opportunities to score. It seemed that we outplayed the Canucks, but no goals were scored. The game ended 0-0, and there is no overtime before elimination matches. The game was frustrating since the ball kept on going out of bounds, and our opponent took about 10-20 seconds each time to take the throw-in. Thus, about 80% of the game was inactive. Had we had more time, I am sure we would have scored. Our system was quite functional for the first time, although we had to remove 1 or 2 robots at times of the game due to miscellaneous electrical or wireless problems. So our record at the competition was 1-1-3. Had we won any of the tied games, we would have advanced.

The outcome was disappointing, but not surprising. We know our new system is an enormous redesign with virtually all aspects of the robots redesigned. Given a couple more weeks, we would probably have been able to win the competition. Given a few more months, we could have made another revision on our electronics and mechanical systems, resulting in very solid robots with unprecidented functionality. I hope that our team next year can take what we have worked on and pack it together into a nice robot design. With the changes we have made (especially an onboard computer), our robots can be a new milestone in the progression of RoboCup.

Today the four quarter-final matches just took place:
Lucky Star (Singapore) 5 - Field Rangers (Singapore) 0
RoboRoos (Australia) 5 - 5DPO (Portugal) 1
CMRoboDragons (USA and Japan) 2 - Canucks (Canada) 1
Fu Fighters (Germany) 3 - Vienna Cubes (Austria) 0

It should be a great semifinal and final!!