David Bascome is proof that you can teach an old dog new tricks.

At the age of 33, the Bermudian striker with the Major Indoor Soccer League's Harrisburg Heat is playing like someone half his age.

He is four points away from racking up 900 - something that only 16 other players have achieved - and yesterday was one of five Harrisburg players selected to play in the 2003 All-Star Game. That honour is the result of some impressive figures this season in a team that currently props up the league's Eastern Conference.

Bascome is sixth in the MISL with 67 points, second with 30 total goals, third with 30 two-point goals and leads all comers with 11 power play goals.

On the verge of hanging up his boots at the end of last season, Bascome says he is a man reborn, and it's all down to one person - Heat coach Erich Geyer.

"Last year at the end of the season I thought `OK, I have to make a decision'," he said from the US yesterday. "I had ACL surgery and wasn't sure whether I would ever play again. All summer I was really beat up, I didn't know what to do and it took a toll on me mentally - did I want to come back into the environment that we had at the club at the time?"

That environment centred around then coach Richard Chinapoo, who Bascome felt was not a good fit for the club.

"When I found out about the new coach coming in and I met him he kind of drove me to push on," he said. "I said `This is exciting for me and now I can get myself back going'. If we had had the same environment as last year I think I would have stopped playing around mid-season."

Bascome said German Geyer changed the whole ethos of what being a Harrisburg footballer was about.

"Being coached is the difference," said Bascome bluntly. "This guy won 13 championships. He has got me in the office every day just teaching me.

"Being the leader of the team as captain I have grasped so much knowledge, not in terms of the physical side of the game, but the mental side.

"I have been here for 12 years and I can guarantee you that this is the first time in six or seven years that I have actually learned something. It's frustrating to a point but it's also a relief - now I have some motivation.

"Last year I was driving myself crazy because I was trying to find my own motivation. I couldn't find it and I was getting more irritable because we were losing games. Right now, we are beating ourselves in these games and we know what we have to do (to put it right)."

When Geyer took over he did something that a lot of other coaches, many here in Bermuda, could do with doing.

"The coach gave us a test at the beginning of the season on the rule book," he said. "He said `Look, you haven't got the time to be focusing on anything else. If you are going to argue with a referee, they are not going to change their call. You have to focus on the game itself'."

That focus is now squarely on the run-in.

Harrisburg, it seems, always fail to live up to expectations, but despite their position at the bottom they have an outside chance of making the play-offs.

They are currently half a game behind Baltimore, having dropped games to Milwaukee and Philadelphia over the weekend. They hit the road tomorrow when they play at San Diego and then travel to Kansas on Saturday night.

"The coach said to us `We are not going to be a first place team'," Bascome said. "I was thinking if I had heard that last year I would have strangled somebody. But because I have heard it this year I understand what he is telling us.

"It takes you a while to gel. We may be a first place, consistent team two years from now, but now we are trying to win a championship. To do that we will have to cheat a little bit. We are going to sneak our way into the play-offs.

"The coach had to explain it to me because I was like `Coach, I want to be first place' and he said `No, be patient'. The teams that we have to play have been together for five or six years and haven't changed many players. We have changed 12 players and have been around for six months."

As a result of that if the Heat can get into the post season, Bascome said they would have nothing to lose and all the pressure would be on their opponents.

Though yet to achieve his ambition of lifting a title, Bascome said no matter what happens at the end of this year he would feel like a champion.

"I told the coach already despite what happens I have won," he said. "Now, I can feel like a winner because I have grasped so much knowledge. I am winning right now.

"I sound like a 16-year-old, kind of rejuvenated," he said. "This is where it's at now. I am winning because I have more information and I am able to pass that on. I can see my players going to college and I can make them more successful, I can help others out.

"People may be like `Man, what is Bascome talking about?' but you have to be here and understand what I have been going through for the past ten or 11 years. It's not all just about the ring. Yeah, I want to win a championship but if I am grasping knowledge and am able make someone else successful, if I don't complete my task then I will have just as good a feeling, if not better."