League Game #1 vs St Croix

We were scheduled to open up the MYSA U13 Classic 1 league season against St Croix Valley (SCV) on Tuesday, May 5.

Last week, I found out that we'd be missing Normy and Bam Bam for the game due to school functions. I emailed Joaquin, the SCV coach and a friend of mine, last week to try and reschedule. He got back to me on Saturday and let me know that it would be difficult for his parent group to make a change at this time, so we had to make it work.

I couldn't go into the game with 14 players. I had seen SCV play our 13 Blue team in State Cup last weekend and was a little worried as they (SCV) looked to have some real pace that would cause us problems. Against a team like that and on the large fields at the Lucy Winton Bell complex (120x75), it wouldn't be good for me to come in with 3 subs.

I looked at my options. Since our 12 Whites were a Tournament Only team, we could not pull up girls from that group to join us. Our only option then for guest players was from our U11 team. Taylor from that group had already guested with us in West Des Moines and could hang with us athletically. I doubted anyone else from that 11 group could. Taylor did well in Iowa, but now we were talking about playing at the U13 age group.

So, I talked with Andy (East Director) and made the decision to roster Bridget and Neve from the 12 Whites with us for the summer. Bridget is an athletically gifted player that Andy and I had decided last fall was a year away from the Blue team. Neve is a solid GK, and the Blue girls would be more than happy to have her join us (and thus not have to play in goal themselves). We wouldn't have the two guests with us for every game, but they would be able to play if/when needed.

The two girls would still be committed to the White team tournaments and training sessions, though they might miss some training if they were suiting up with us for a game.

All this was finalized on Monday morning, which happened to be the last possible date to drop/add/transfer players through MYSA. Emailed the two families to make sure they were OK with things. Connected with our club president to sign the transfer forms and fax them back to me. Got them to MYSA that morning. Connected with our Registrar to get the players transferred in her database, allowing MYSA to expedite the printing of the player passes. Had Babes's dad pick up the passes from MYSA in Minnetonka, and we were rolling.

I also found out on Monday morning that apparently teams MUST reschedule games if the request came in within two weeks after the schedules were released. Had emails and phone messages into the East District Rep for clarification, with nothing resolved on Monday night.

Tuesday morning, saw an email come across from the East District Rep to SCV, basically stating that they had to reschedule the game as per MYSA policy. I was just looking for clarification on the mandatory rescheduling rule for future reference. We had the player passes in hand yesterday and had guest players lined up, so we were prepared to go ahead with the game. Called the SCV Coaching Director and Joaquin to let them know that we were NOT looking to reschedule the game and were ready to play. Caught them before they had gotten word out to their families about the cancellation of the game, so we were good to go for that night.

I met Babes's dad in St Louis Park to pick up the passes, met Bridget at her school to get her's signed and snap a head shot pic, cruised over to Woodbury to meet up with Neve and her mom at Kinkos to get Neve's signature and head shot photo, spent 30 minutes in Caribou Coffee across from Kinkos cropping Bridget's head shot from a team photo I had on my computer because I forgot the download cord for my digital camera at home, spent another 30 minutes at Kinkos as the unqualified Kinkos guy could not figure out why the color printer was not working from the laptop station, dashed home to see my wife and little girl for 30 minutes, then off to the fields for the game. Man, that was a lot of work...

* * * * *

Back on field #22, same field we played Eagan on for our first State Cup game a few weeks back.

Weather looked foreboding with some thunderstorms blowing through the area most of the afternoon.

Girls arrived 45 minutes prior to the game. Pre-game talk was all about looking for that killer pass when it was on, the pass that would get over or through defenders and allow us to attack the space behind them. This has been my focus for the last month. Soon, it will change to attacking the space in front of the defenders (forwards checking back) in order to draw defenders out of position, leaving gaps in dangerous areas for third runners to attack.

There was a strong wind giving the team attacking the north goal a big advantage.  Asked our captains to take the wind if they won the toss, but SCV won it and elected to take the wind.  Could be a tough first half for us.

Started in a 4-4-2.

We came out on fire and spent the first 15 minutes in their half of the field. Not only were we in their end, but we were dangerous.  3 or 4 corners and just as many crosses that were served in were either not connected on, or dropped to players' feet in front of goal and were scrambled away by SCV as we seemed a bit slow to act.

SCV eventually settled in a bit and the game became more of an even contest.  On their first real forray into our end, we won possession in our defending third on the right flank but gave up a throw in with an errant pass.  The resulting long throw took Mal (RD) by surprise and sailed over her head, to be picked up by a SCV attacker at the corner of our penalty box.  Neither of our CDs (Meg or Phi Phi) were in a good enough position to apply pressure, so the SCV attacker got a volley shot off that looped high over Neve's (GK) hands into the far side netting.  Very similar goal to how SCV scored on our Blue team in State Cup, with the ball almost traveling vertically straight down across the goal line.  No chance for Neve on what I would consider should not have even been a half chance at goal.  Tough to give that up after we had been playing well.  But that's soccer...

10 minutes later, the girls battled back to pull level on a great goal.

Bargsy (RM) won the ball back for us by using her body to step in front of and shield off the SCV outside left defender who was trying to dribble past her.  She played the way she was facing and laid a good ball back to Cal (RD).  Cal hit the served up ball first time with her right foot, crossing the ball to the top of the far side of the box.  Gia (LM) ran forward to contain the ball (not let it get outside of her) and deflected the ball to Mickey who was also up trying to get around the ball.  Mickey took a touch and passed a neat little ball to Babes (LF).  Babes held off her marking defender and hit a left foot bomb into the upper near post of the goal.  Really well worked goal, a goal that just makes me grin from ear to ear. 

Halftime came and saw the game deadlocked at 1-1.  I was very happy about how we were playing and began to give the group some tactical ideas for the second half when I saw the weather coming up from the West (I had been facing east the entire half).  Black clouds thick with rain. 

15 seconds after the second half whistle, the ref called the game due to lightning seen in the approaching clouds.  We could wait 30 minutes from the last lightning strike we saw, but it was already 8PM (late start to to the 7:05PM scheduled kick off) and we would be out of daylight soon.  We would have to reschedule.  Imagine that...

Got into my car in the parking lot as the hail hit.  Good call ref.