Posts Tagged ‘soccer’
Wild Game
What a day that was. I initially chose the title of this post as a reference to Delilah’s diet yesterday, but the US Women’s soccer team decided to play the final match of the 2015 World Cup tournament in such a way as to steal the meaning. What an outburst of effort they put forth in that first half last night! Carli Lloyd getting a hat trick as quick as she did was astounding to witness.
They played the final two games of the tournament as if they were the best team in the world. I’m happy they were able to lift the cup at the end. They earned it.
Earlier in the day, our dog took it upon herself to hunt for her own breakfast. Her usual fare from us is a mixture of dry food and some meat from a can, twice a day, but yesterday she seemed particularly determined to get her protein from live-catches.
With Cyndie gone to the lake, I was on my own to try to keep track of Delilah as she romped off-leash in the manner she has grown accustomed after just one week of being watched by a new master. In just a few days, Cyndie accomplished more control over our dog roaming freely than I was able to achieve during the entire time I was home with her.
Not long after I had become engrossed in my tasks of putting out morning feed for the horses, and cleaning up their manure, I realized Delilah had gotten out of sight. Eventually, I found her on the other side of the barn, excitedly engaged in a “negotiation” with a young rabbit. It was not an exchange that the rabbit was going to win.
Meanwhile, the horses were demonstrating their high sensitivity to the predator-prey drama unfolding, even though it was out of their line of sight. They knew exactly what was going down, and remained on high alert until it was fully concluded. It prompted an increased sensitivity in me for the poor victim whose life was ended for our dog’s meal.
Back in the house, I opted to serve just dry food for the morning feeding. After her early morning excitement, Delilah was confined to her kennel in the yard while I went under ear muffs and used the power trimmer and then the diesel tractor to mow down more rampant growth around the property.
When I had finished, and it was time to feed the horses again, I hooked up Delilah to her leash and brought her with me. When we got to the back pasture, where I had just mowed, I decided to let her run free inside the fence. Before I could even get her unhooked, she reacted to a scent, despite the strong wind, and pulled hard to get after something. When I opened the clip on her leash, she bolted for the spot uphill in the direction from which we had just come.
It looked like a mouse that had probably been killed by the mower. It appears that the scent of death is something Delilah is exceptional at detecting. I moved on without her and headed toward the barn, to put out the horse’s evening feed. Delilah caught up to me eventually and lingered for a while, briefly annoying the horses with some aggressive barking and threatening gestures. One of these days she is going to get kicked and it will be no surprise.
To her credit, when I finished in the paddock and was ready to wheel manure out to the compost pile, she heard my call and came running from somewhere out of sight. The success thrilled me, until I got the gate open and she sprinted up the trail into our woods without me.
I finished puttering with the compost piles and contemplated how I might get her to come back. Then I heard the tags clanking on her collar. She returned with her 3rd prize of the day: a freshly killed squirrel.
Our intrepid hunter seemed driven to not eat canned dog food this day. She, and the US women’s soccer team, had their hearts set on wild game, for sure.
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Pure Joy
Even though there was much in the way of work being done on the main day of ‘Work Weekend,’ at the lake place we call Wildwood, there was no shortage of fun in the endeavors of the day.
After toiling away on the beach to reclaim the area from the unending processes of Mother Nature to take over our sandy little oasis, I pitched in, literally, to help others in improving the landscape in front of the lodge. The grass grows really well in the spaces near the building where it isn’t wanted, and I assisted with digging it up using a garden fork that looked like a very close relative of the pitch fork that has become one of my primary tools at home. A beautiful array of perennials were planted into the newly turned soil.
Throughout the tasks, conversations blossomed in an annual renewing of connection with members of the community who scatter to their city lives for most of the winter.
Taking a pause from the work, I stopped back to the house where Cyndie was resting her hip and reading a book. I sat with her for a bit, until I noticed she had nodded off into a nap. Figuring I might as well go get my computer to take advantage of the time, I climbed the stairs to our room, finding my laptop beside the great big bed. Since she was already asleep, I figured I didn’t need to take it back downstairs to be in her proximity, and so laid on the bed to check in with the world.
I awoke in a slobbery mess of drool, after a most delicious unplanned nap of my own.
Hearing the words, “soccer game,” I descended the stairs to rejoin humanity and rediscovered how much joy I get from playing the beautiful game. I think it started as 4-v-4, but soon grew to include more people than the space actually allows. Maybe that is why the decision gets made that we won’t use borders, and play continues regardless the fact the ball is within the jungle gym play area, around the SUV parked on the driveway, or even behind the goals, like a game of hockey.
Slowly, in a reverse of how the numbers swelled to the maximum, players wander off to other pursuits, often without saying a thing. After battling situations that feel a lot like playing short-handed in a game of hockey, the game is paused and a player volunteers to switch so play can resume with reasonable balance. In the end, it came down to me facing one last challenge from 6-year-old nephew, Beck, for some 1-v-1.
He said, “Go over to your goal.”
“No, that’s an awful long way away. Let’s just play a small game right here,” I encouraged.
He kicked the ball around me and headed the length of the field to ‘my goal.’ What could I do? I chased after him to protect my goal. He was a tenacious foe and I soon realized he would not quit until he succeeded in getting that ball in the net. I was tired and wanted to be done, so I provided an opportunity. He missed. The ball rolled wide. A few near-misses later, the ball found the target and he was satisfied. Game over.
Pure joy.
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Soccer Thrills
Oh. My. Gosh. Yesterday’s Olympic soccer match between the US and Canadian women was an incredible competition. Tightly contested, very physical, and subject to some uncharacteristic officiating. I completely empathize with the frustration and anger of the Canadian team and fans. The Canadian goalie being called for taking too much time was a real surprise.
Both teams kept working and getting chances, all the way to the end. It seems to me that the ball could have gone in for either team. The fact that Alex Morgan succeeded at the late, late moment of extra time, already past the 30-minute overtime, was… pick your superlative adjective: remarkable; outstanding; incredible; extraordinary; exceptional; astounding; sensational; unbelievable; amazing; momentous! Or, from another perspective: heartbreaking.
I will savor the moment of Morgan’s touch with her head, and the absolutely perfect arc of the ball, beyond the reach of the Canadian Keeper, into the net. I look forward to the Gold medal match with mixed emotions. My nerves fray at the incredible tension of high stakes soccer matches when US teams are involved, but it is really a thrill to be watching the US team play in the Gold medal game.
I’m going to need to take Thursday afternoon off from work! I hope the US team is able to make it worth my time. I wouldn’t mind if they found a way to not have it come down to the last minute… especially, if they do so by having a lead.
Delicate Attempt
The results are in, and in my opinion, my performance at yesterday morning’s soccer [futsal] game was a mixture of success and failure. But that is a good thing. It would have been a surprise if it turned out to be just a smashing success. What would that be like, anyway; that I could play just fine with no pain? No, that would fool me into thinking I could go back to my old routine, and all indications point to that being a counterproductive plan of action.
I definitely felt some impairment due to the discomfort of my degenerative disc disease. However, that made it easier to remain very conscious of my situation and helped me to purposefully control my stride. I think I did a pretty good job of running with a very smooth gate, light on my feet, as opposed to the usual pounding I am prone to do. If that made me slower, I was compensating for it a bit by making early decisions about where I was going to go. I headed back into a defensive position much quicker than I would have previously.
That is actually a very smart mindset for me to get into, because now that I think of it, the clomping back to help on defense that I used to do, most often involved me chasing an opponent from behind, too late to do any good.
Although I believe it was entirely serendipitous, one of the successes I enjoyed was scoring goals! I’m generally not a very prolific goal scorer, but I had 4 really good goals that came from being fed beautiful passes when I was positioned on the far side of the net. It provided a nice reward and a feeling that I contributed something positive for having shown up. I think it would be a stretch to say that the attempt to soften my effort for this indoor game was responsible for the uncharacteristic increase in scoring prowess, but the goals sure served to sweeten the morning’s effort for me.
One of the failures of my attempt to play at a slower pace, with less physical impact, was turning the ball over when I had plenty of time to make a decision and execute a play. I just didn’t have my usual touch. Several times, the ball just got lost in my feet. One time, I actually swung to kick, and missed the ball. I was trying to shift my weight and keep my eyes up, and by the time I kicked, the ball had moved. Two times in particular, my turnover led to an immediate goal by the other team.
Another time, I misplayed an attempt to block a shot and it deflected off me, directly into our net. I wondered aloud if that was “a Hays,” because it led to the 5th and winning goal for the opponents, but players assured me it fell outside of the ‘own goal’ act associated with that label. I offered an opinion that it might deserve to be a sub-category.
It was a morning of mixed results, which I am taking as a promising outcome, overall.
Dubious Fame
I did it again. I pulled “a Hays” the other day. It had been a while since the dubious feat that was named in my honor had occurred in our morning Futsal matches. Luckily, just a few days later, another player did the same thing, allowing me to finally enjoy not being the only person to accomplish the act which very quickly became named for me.
Our morning soccer games are played indoors on a wood-floor gymnasium. We set up PUGG® pop up goals on each end of the court and we are ready to go. If enough players show up, our ideal is 5 players on each team. You never know who will be there, so the teams randomly form each morning.
We have found that the number 5 also works well for the number of goals needed to win. First team to 5 is the victor, the score resets to 0 – 0, and we keep on playing. That way, we get multiple games in each morning. If suffering a 5 – 0 drubbing, the quick reset gives a fresh start and opportunity to alter ones fortunes.
In regular 11 v 11 soccer matches on the full-sized pitch, goals come few and far between. One goal takes on greater significance. In our games, played three times a week, for more than a decade, there are a lot of goals scored. It isn’t all that surprising that on a rare occasion the ball might bounce off a player and careen into the very net he was trying to defend. Okay, sometimes a player might even kick a ball that takes an errant trajectory to land in his own goal.
The term, “own goal” has its own Wikipedia entry: An own goal occurs in goal-scoring games when a player scores a goal that is registered against his or her own team. It is usually accidental, and may be a result of an attempt at defensive play that failed or was spoiled by opponents. There are video compilations that celebrate the own goal phenomena. Thank goodness that I don’t find my name associated with such a thing on the bigger stage of soccer.
No, the grand accomplishment named after me is related to the fact that we play our games up to 5. We already had a name for the act of kicking an own goal, labeled for one lucky fellow who demonstrated a penchant for doing so in our games. Then one morning, with my team in the precarious position of having 4 goals against us, I inadvertently kicked the ball into my own net to give the other team their fifth goal, and the game victory.
Not a worry. We just reset to 0 – 0 and play another game. They’ll forget about my gaffe soon enough. Then I did it again. Twice in one morning. Two games lost because I kicked the ball into my own net. The art of losing a game by way of making an own goal on the fifth point is forever referred to as “a Hays” in our morning games.
Relative Something 