[lookout123]

Saturday was a genuinely enjoyable soccer day. Lil Lookout has been frustrated at the idea of only playing one game on Saturday until the outdoor season starts in about two months so I was really hoping that he'd bring some zing back to his game this week.

We played a team coached by one of the hot heads that has been around for awhile. This is a guy who has bitched and moaned about the horribly unfair situation he sees in his team finishing behind mine every session. The guy is an absolute meathead who brutalizes his kid because he isn't as good as Lil Lookout. No seriously, I feel bad for the kid because he is a good player and likes the game... his personality just doesn't suit that of an attacking player. He is outstanding as a holding midfielder, defender, or keeper, but those aren't the glory roles so dad keeps pushing him into something that just isn't meant to be his role. Anyway, ironically as the program has become more and more embroiled in BS, this coach has been buddying up to me because he doesn't really understand what is happening but he has witnessed me come out on top when stupid stuff happened in the past.

Anyway, the game was a blast. The other team has K, L, and S as GOOD players. My two really good players LL and B are better, but when you step over to the rest of the team, the other team has better average skill than mine. I knew we would win IF LL and B both brought their A games and worked hard, but they've both been a bit discouraged lately as the team just doesn't gel well enough to keep a good passing game going. They are both preoccuppied with the Club team and have let their energy slip a bit in rec league. Not this week though.

The teams traded body blows with no score for the first five minutes. It was a pretty hectic pace up and down the field. I held LL and B back as a defensive wall and pushed my two runners without a clue up into forward positions to poke and prod for weaknesses. The other team was passing much better than my kids did so their was a lot of potential to be punished on the counterattack. After ten minutes the game had settled into a decent rhythm of their defense stopping my kids passing the ball up to the wall and their forwards dribbling right through my midfield until LL or B would strip the ball and counter. Our attacks died out because my two forwards weren't skilled enough to receive passes and shoot quickly. I switched the formation to put B as center forward with J (good ideas, but slow reactions) on his left and K(no ideas, no skills but runs around and confuses everyone) on his right. LL was the sole midfielder with orders that if he chose to play lazy and let his team down he would have to play defense the rest of the day. (He's developed the negative tendency to not work much to get the ball back because he's overly confident to outscore anyone when he does have the ball.) I had K and L on defense and S in the goal. That meant a decent back line with a weak keeper and a great offensive midfielder who is hit or miss on defensive duties. Either it would work great or we'd lose really badly. As it happened LL got kicked in the family jewels and it made him mad. From that point on he was possessed. He looked like a man with his hair on fire. I honestly have not seen my kid play that well in at least 6 months.

At halftime he was very discouraged because he had only scored one point. He had knocked the other keeper off his feet twice with blocked shots and had three assists but he still measures his worth in goals scored. I tried to set him straight on that and kept the same formation.

The teams continued to pummel eachother with numerous shots on goal but we were still winning 5-4 with ten minutes left. At that point I became confident that my kids would run away with it. K and L from the other team looked dejected. They had tried everything they knew and just couldn't unlock our defense. LL and B were finally linking up better and LL had regained some confidence in his defensive duties. LL blocked a goal bound shot with his head and then chased it down before dribbling through 5 players, losing the ball twice, getting it back and then crashed a left foot shot in. After actually seeing success after fighting hard the kid was unstoppable. He and B went on an unbroken run in the last five minutes to bring the score to 11-5.

good game based on the scoreline, but great game based on LL actually showing some hunger.

The best moment was when he was surrounded on the left side of goal, trapped at an impossible angle. he pulled off a dragback that was impressive but couldn't open up the angle to shoot. He then pulled it back again (effectively hopping on his left foot while rolling the ball with his right, evading the defenders' reaching feet) then he kicked what looked like a mis-hit. He actually banked it off the wall about 3 feet to the left of the goal and headed in the rebound. Great freaking move. I wish he'd teach me some of his tricks. /proud dad/