Final Practice of the Season

Last night was our last practice. It was cold and my co-coach was out, so I wasn't feeling very ambitious. We did the dribbling through cone gates drill again, followed by two rounds of sharks and minnows and finished with a scrimmage. I've modified the sharks and minnows drills by adding a line of cones along the midfield stripe and telling the kids to keep their heads up and ball close to avoid knocking the cones over.

My trophies are shipping today, so I hope to get them on Friday in time to present them at the final game on Saturday. One of our team families is hosting a post-season party in two weeks, so I can give the trophies out then if they don't arrive this week.

I'm going to miss having our weekly practices. We all go out for pizza afterwords. We have a nice group of families so it ends up being pretty fun. Oh well, I suppose the spring season (in March) will roll around soon enough. It's getting to be too cold for the kids to have much fun anyway.

They're calling for 67 degrees and sunny weather for the final game on Saturday, so that should be a nice ending to a good season. We're playing the team that divides into A and B teams and likes to kick the ball out of bounds a lot, so it should be interesting.

Plugs

Our jerseys were done by Lynnhaven Screen Printing in Virginia Beach. They printed a logo on the front and number on the back of each t-shirt for an all-in price of $7 per shirt. I highly recommend them to anyone in the Hampton Roads area. The internet services I found we're more like $15 per shirt, plus shipping, so I got a great deal.

I order my team trophies from http://www.crownawards.com/. Engraving is free and they turn the order around quickly (order on Monday, receive on Friday). Their website is really easy to use. I got last season's trophies for $3.50 each and stepped it up this time to a whopping $5.95 each. Shipping is $12.50. So I paid about $65 for nine trophies.

Finally, a game!

We got to play this weekend. And play we did. We came out of the gate a little slowly, only winning the first half by 3-2 on my field and by about 7-5 on the other field. But the second half was a totally different story. We dominated on both fields. On my field, we won the second half by a score of about 15-1. I understand that the story was similar on the other field. We pressured their goal throughout and our recovery defense -- to the extent we needed it -- was intense.

I ordered the team trophies today and hope to have them in time for our final game this Saturday.

Here's a rousing edition of our team cheer (featuring the new kits):

Picture Night

Our last game was rained out. Second time this year that has happened. With the two rain-outs and the Columbus Day weekend thrown in the mix, we've only had games on three of the last six weekends. And we have rain headed toward us that is supposed to rain out this weekend's game as well. Bummer.

Nevertheless, we've continued to practice. This week's practice was our ninth of the season (compared to only four games!).

We are fortunate to have the top childrens' photographer in the area as one of our team moms, and she was nice enough to volunteer to take our team and individual pictures this season at cost. We started practice at 4:50 (instead of the usual 5:00) to allow more time for the pictures. She finished up by 5:10, allowing us to still get in an almost-full practice. The kids were wound up from having to sit still for 20 minutes during pictures, so they weren't able to get it together for any of our more structured drills. Instead we played two round of Sharks and Minnows with a Goal and then scrimmaged for about 20 minutes. It ended up being a good practice all around.

Reaction to the New Kits

The kids went nuts over the new kits. They immediately started shouting out what numbers they wanted. Fortunately, for the most part they all wanted different numbers. We had three extra shirts, so even the last kid to choose got to pick his favorite from among four choices. Everyone was thrilled and the parents seemed happy as well.

Practice went pretty well. We did the "dribbling through cone gates" drill, finishing with the left foot. Then practiced pulling the ball back with the bottom of the foot. One side finished left-footed and the other side right-footed, alternating after each shot. My other coach pulled several players aside and worked on left-footed finishing. As always, we finished practice with a scrimmage before handing out the new kits. Our game this weekend may get rained out. Next Tuesday is picture night.

New Kits and Left Feet

We got new kits for the kids with our team logo (look to the right at the top of the page) on them. Red t-shirts with a white logo and a number on the back. Up to now, we've been alternating between the green and white t-shirts sold by the league. Now we'll have our own identity!

We will hand them out at practice tonight. Just can't decide whether to let them choose their number (and risk arguments and potential disappointment) or just assign them numbers randomly. We'll probably decide last minute. The kids are going to love them!

Lately, we have been working on shooting with the left foot. As far as I can tell, all my kids are right footed. Now is the time to get them comfortable using their left foot. Once they get to be about 10, it becomes very difficult to learn how to use your off foot.