Another Shut-out (And Another Win)

Monday's practice we had several players missing either due to unresolved homework issues, forgetting their gear at home or just not feeling like coming to practice. The players we did have show up worked hard and it felt like we got a few things accomplished. The highlight of the practice was when some guy driving through the alley next to our land leaned out his window with a huge grin on his face and yelled out his window, "Y'all's playing...uh...football and you needs ta play soccer... uh...wait... y'all playing soccer and..." and then he was too far away to finish his ribbing.

Tuesday we loaded up in four cars and got to our closest park for some full field practice, this time missing less players. We are still struggling to use our time wisely, but it appears we are starting to learn enough to help us grow as a team.

We took the day off on Wednesday.

Thursday was our first away game of the season and - like all away games in middle school sports - getting the whole team to the game was half the battle. In the last 10 days I sent home the directions for tonight's game twice and I still had at least four parents show up at school to follow me to the game. The Mapquest directions we a tad bit confusing but ultimately got us to two blocks away from the field, close enough to see the field and figure out how to get there. We only lost a couple cars from our caravan on the way- which was enough to shrink us to 9 players at kick-off. BUT- as we ran out to start the game, two of our players ran to the sideline and before halftime we had 6 subs. (It turned out that we had played at this field two years ago against a different opponent and I had flashbacks of having trouble finding the field then as well.)

The discombobulation of our warm-ups contributed to our slow start. We got a couple good attacks early but nothing serious, while our defense actually allowed our goalie to see some early action for a change. Once we settled down, our forwards locked in and we scored three goals in the final 15 minutes of the first half to lead 3-0. One of the goals was off of a corner kick (something we spent a lot of time working on this week) where our player kneed the ball off of one bounce into the back of the net.

We scored a fourth goal two minutes into the second half and then I switched up our line-up to again move all of our girls up front to attack. Just like the last time we did this, our most aggressive girl got two great looks at the goal but missed twice, inches off from scoring each time.

So, we now sit at 4-0 on the season (3-0 in conference play), having outscored our opponents now 18-0. This Saturday we play a conference foe who is usually one of the top teams in the conference and then on Monday we play the best team in the conference (our only loss last year and the team we beat in the championship). Come Tuesday morning, we will know for sure if we really are as good as our record and our scores indicate thus far.