When Tampines Rovers goalkeeper Syazwan Buhari took off his left glove midway through his warm-up for Saturday's Singapore Cup final, his first reaction was to curse and lament to himself: "Why now?"
Barely half an hour before the Stags' most important game of the season kicked off, he suffered a freak injury to his pinkie finger during a shooting drill with goalkeeper coach William Phang.
"I've injured my fingers before and usually it is just a sprain and I can still move them," said the 27-year-old. "This time, it was stiff, as though it was locked up, so I knew something was wrong."
He went behind the goalposts, removed the glove and saw his left little finger bent almost 45 degrees at an unnatural angle. "At that point, I was feeling so many things: panic, anger, frustration," he recalled.
He decided to play through the pain and was rewarded as Tampines beat Warriors FC 4-3 in an enthralling game to claim their first piece of silverware since 2013.
To cap it off, he even saved a penalty from Sahil Suhaimi with four minutes left, although Fairoz Hasan put in the rebound.
Pulling out from the game was never an option, explained the shot-stopper.
"Firstly, it's a final. Secondly, if I could not play, it would count as one substitution (because the first XI was already pencilled in). Seeing as we were playing our fifth game in 15 days, and considering the condition of our players, one substitution could make a big difference to the team," he said.
The match doctor had warned him that making a routine save or landing on the finger could aggravate the injury but Syazwan still opted to have his finger popped back into place. He taped it, put on his glove, and wrapped more tape to secure the ring finger and little finger together.
"I ended up making three saves, including the penalty, with that hand," he quipped.
Tampines coach Gavin Lee hailed his goalkeeper's heroics.
"Syazwan is a model pro. Not only is he a very good player, he's a very good person as well," said Lee, 29. "When he made the decision to play through the pain, we trusted him. During the game, I didn't even think about it; I knew that if he said he could play, it meant he could.
"We were all very proud of him, and it was fantastic what he was able to do during the game."
The next day, Syazwan went to Raffles Hospital where X-rays revealed a suspected fracture. He will return for another test this week.
But, whatever pain he endured was worth it, he said, as he now owns his first senior competitive winner's medal.
Before this, he was part of the Singapore selection side that won the Sultan of Selangor's Cup in 2016.
He said: "It makes my Singapore Cup win more memorable and sweeter, because it wasn't easy and I had to go through a lot to get my hands on that trophy."
