Position, Position

Well, the girls are coming right along. Ali is a wild-woman, running all over the field, absolutely fearless. Katie, I think, has finally gotten the point about being a forward, and actually waited somewhere past the mid-field mark!

More common, are my defenders. Somehow they managed to get the impression that they need to stand at the outside corner of the penalty box. So, when the ball whooshed past them, they would poke their toe at it and watch it bounce towards the goal. Sometimes the goal keeper would grab it, but then again, sometimes they forgot that they could pick up the ball as keeper!

The team that played after us was unprepared; they asked if we would be the ref!

The name's the game...

Well, the Coral Sea Stars it is! And it won on the first ballot; which was a bit unexpected - especially when you consider that some of the teams in U12 still haven't finalized. [FYI, my son's team is officially the Flame Throwers!]

My daughter has played two games so far. The first game was forgettable: nobody played to their position, nobody remembered how to throw in the ball...the only bright spot was our goalkeeper. She is fearless! She got stomped on by a bigger girl, but wouldn't come out of the game. Then, she took out another opponent who "forgot" that you can't run into the keeper.

This week's game was much better. We had about 80% coverage. Of course, Gwendolyn (my little one) stood on the corner of the penalty area for most of the game, but did get a few kicks in. The high point of the game was probably when Trevor (who is almost 2!) threw some of the green slimy Goldfish (tm) in my hair at halftime.

Coral Sea Stars. Is that a soccer team or a fish?

So, after scrambling around I managed to get my parent's to fill out the volunteer forms, and we got the uniforms! I think they are orange, but my wife insists that they are "coral." So my daughter spent all day listing possible team names (coaches perogative - I get to "suggest" the first team name).

Her first choice is the "Coral Sea Stars", which I think is sort of clever for a 7-year old.
After that, it's "Beautiful Sunrise" - try to put *that* on a banner!

Until next time...

To ref, or not to ref continued

I almost forgot! After taking the intermediate class, and reffing some all star games, I finally got the referee administrator to sign off on my form! One more signature, and I'll be official!

It will probably take two more years to get the next 25 games under my belt to go for advanced...but I may be able to do some U14 or U16 games this year. Should be kind of interesting!

Another new year begins

Well...last night was the referee's meeting. Same old stuff, but there was one interesting rule change: during the throw in, the defender has to remain two meters away. I managed to schedule all the games I'm going to ref as well; since my son is now in U12, I snagged all the games immediately after his (on the same field, no less!). Of course, that meant I had to check against my daughter's games (U8, you know) -- there looks like only two conficts!

So, I'll have to swoop over to the little one's field, while my wife cheers on my son. Ah, what a tangled web we weave, when we practice to, er, play soccer.