Tsunami? More like "A Drop in The Bucket"

On Saturday, I experienced something that youth sports coaches have always had to deal with.  A situation that, try as you might, you can't control.  When our game started on Saturday, I was faced with an entirely different group of girls than my usual players.

Before you wonder why I had a team full of new players, let me explain.  These weren't new players... they werre my regular players that played (with three notable exceptions) like absoloute CRAP!!!!!

The game started out quite normally.  The opposition was no better than my team, in fact, my girls were really pressuring the other team right from the start.  My girls were playing like they normally plaed.  About ten or fifteen minutes into the game, SoccerGirl scored a goal, which made her and the rest of the girls happy... and then disaster struck.

The girls decided that they were tired.

They decided that they were tired, and fell apart.  All of a sudden, the hustle went away.  Some of the girls decided they would jog up and down the field instead of RUNNING.  Most of them WOULDN'T SHOOT THE BALL AT THE FREAKIN' goal until they were three feet away!!!!  Some of them were so contact averse that they would rather let the other players take the ball rather than physically challenging for it.  My God did they piss me off. 

There were some highlights, however.  SoccerGirl kept it together and played defense like a madwoman.   C, my little pit bull, chased down opponents and broke up plays.  D, my goalkeeper stopped shot after shot.  If not for the three of them, we would have been doomed.

The fortunate thing is that while my girls weren't doing very well, they were able to fend off the other team, holding them scoreless until the last three minutes of the game.

The game ended in a tie 1-1, and to tell you the truth, we were lucky to get away with that.

Comments

[melissaz]

That is so maddening. We have that all the time. My older son was particularly bad about it this season and I'm not letting him try out for club soccer as a result.

It's always interesting to see what team shows up for the games at this age. :)

[Grandmere]

Typical of the age group! Sorry to say....I tught that age group for years, and girls are particularly interesting. Hang in there, next week will be better. They can turn on a dime.