soccer dad

Both boys' soccer teams had districts over the weekend. No. 1 son lost, No. 2 son won. They were good games, but it was a lot of driving.
The U14 team are a lot of fun to watch. They're have talent at every position, but they have a tendancy to get down and quit when things aren't going their way. In Saturday's game we went up 1-0 at the start of the second half and held the lead for a while before the opponents snuck one in (we snuck ours in, too :-)).

That was okay, we were still playing well.

Then the game got a little physical - not out of control, but more physical - and my son wound up getting a yellow card for a slide tackle from behind. He definitely deserved the penalty. I thought the card was maybe a little much, only because one of the players on the other team was called for three separate dangerous plays without a card. Actually, I don't mean to complain about the ref - I really thought he did well. I would have liked for his assistants to be a little more helpful, but all in all the game was well officiated.

The problem was with our team. As soon as my son got the card, the wind was completely out of our sails. We just quit trying. The other team scored two goals in quick succession and won 3-1. We need to learn to continue playing hard even when everything breaks against us.

The U11 games were less frustrating - but then winning usually is. My boy was in goal for both games and did well. He had played in the field for the last few games, so he was a little rusty in the first game on Saturday. They scored one on him early, but that was all.

The championship game on Sunday was very exciting. The other team scored first. The field was soaked and there was puddle in the box that made it hard to play the ball - it would be heading in at a good pace, my boy would head out to pick it up and it would hit the puddle and stop well before he expected. That left him out of position and allowed the opposing player to get to the ball first and tap it in.

We scored one to tie it and that's how the game ended. My son had a couple of diving saves in the second half to hold them and we managed to win in the second overtime period on a corner kick that one of our players bent into the goal. Very exciting stuff - at least for a soccer dad.