Trudge down to Canton (6:10 am wake-up time, ugh!) for the first two games of the fall season.
The good thing this year is that we are playing the best of the best in this 8v8 league; I don’t think there’s a tougher U10 division in a league in this state. And that’s a bad thing as well, since, I’m not completely convinced we’re ready for that…..we don’t practice as a team for the most part (we practice with the other 8 kids who play on the 6v6 team). The other teams have played three or four games in pre-season tournaments; we had to schedule a scrimmage with the older age group to try and get ready for the weekend.
I’ve told Suzanne that I think Sunday morning could be really ugly….
Game 1: 8:30 am start against the Tigers. They’ve been featured here before; we lost to them in the Canton Cup in a crazy game. *They* played in a preseason tournament with the two soccer clubs that everyone would agree are the best in the state and won the tournament. My hope for this game? To not lose by more than five goals……
And the first half went by much as I thought it would and we were down 3-0. The first goal seemed like it shouldn’t have happened; our goalie bobbled the ball and they punched it in. The other two goals, well, that’s how it rolls when you play with the big boys…..
Second half starts and it’s pretty even….and about 10 minutes into the 30 minute half they make a mistake on a goal kick and turn it over and we punch it in….it’s 3-1. And it is a completely different game after that….
They, by and large, are better than us on the first touch and seem to have a lot of possession. But that changed as the game went on and after a scrum around the net (Matthew picked off a pass and centered it….and after three of four different players on our team touched it we scored) it’s 3-2. And momentum, fickle thing that it is, is clearly on our side.
With about three minutes to go we get a 2-on-1 and score and it’s tied up. The last two minutes of the game had all seven Tiger field players in their deep quarter of the field desperately trying to hold the boys off…..we don’t score, the game ends as a 3-3 tie.
Some ties suck….this tie, it was pretty clear who was ecstatic about it and who was hanging their heads like they had lost….
Matthew played well; held the line on defense and chipped in with possession and offense when needed. I’ve written here that I don’t particularly care for Matthew sliding so much during the game but this game sealed it for me; Coach Alex is all in favor if you do it right, and Matthew does it better than most. Many times when I’m muttering that he’s on the field on his butt, Alex is yelling “Good stuff, Matthew”, etc. I’ve told Matthew I’m sorry, and will shut up on this subject, but, if you slide, get up fast…..
Game 2: Play at noon against Waza. They lost at the same time we were playing earlier; they lost to the Tigers 4-0 on Saturday. So, expectations are a little higher for this game….
…and the boys came out so flat it was scary. No hustle, no energy, and Waza cleaned their clock, 8-2.
Literally, not less than 15 seconds after the game started, the Waza player dribbled by one guy, completely blew by Matthew and blasted the ball by our goalie for the first goal.
They scored again in the first half to make it 2-0 going into the break. Matthew looked dead on his feet; hard to think he’s out of shape with all of the stuff that kid does but he just was not here today…..and our defense paid for it. He was not the only one with dead legs out there though….
Suzanne got these shots of him making his moves….
And I think those two moves were being made as he tried to get by this Waza player. Unlike the girls from the Ox Roast tournament, who play with girl teams during the regular season, this one plays with the boys.
I told Matthew after one of the Ox Roast games that he “ate the other team’s lunch”….his passes just tore them apart. I told Matthew after this game that he needs to ask this girl for his lunch money back. She beat him so badly on multiple occasions the only thing we can do is joke about it now and resolve to do better next time. She scored four goals, and two of them (including that one I described above) were possible because she made moves to go by Matthew and had wide open shots on goal.
Now, he had his success against her at times, but, in the end, I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that he had nightmares about her…..
Five minutes left in the game, the Lunch Girl gets two fingers into Matthew’s eyes and he’s down for a moment and out of the game (afterwards it was pretty swollen but no bruising). It’s 4-2 when Matthew leaves, and our defense decides to check out of the game as well and they score four goals over the next five minutes to coast to the 8-2 win.
I imagine practice this week will be interesting……I know a lot of the post-game talk after this game was on being ready mentally. Looks to be a real even grouping of teams too…six teams, no team with two losses, only one team undefeated after two games. Of course, our next two games, away and at home, are against that outfit.
