Soccer Monsters

 

 

 

 

Yet another soccer season has come to a close. Its time to look back, and reflect on what we learned.

First, we learned that Hannah seems to have more interest in being out on the field than either of her brothers. Its not that they don't enjoy the game. Its just that the game isn't really their top priority, shall we say. The boys like being part of a team, they like wearing their cool uniforms, and they REALLY like the post-game snacks. The actual game, with the running and all of that kicking and whatnot, they could mostly do without it seems.

Jude did seem to get the general idea of cheering when his team scored and giving a hearty frowny-face foot stomp when they did not. At the beginning of the season he would attempt to kick the ball if it rolled directly in to his foot (I say attempt because even when the ball did roll directly in to his foot he was not necessarily successful in then kicking it in the desired direction). By the end of the season though he was quite often seen running towards the ball in a proactive attempt to make contact with it before it made contact with him. The focus of his gmae however remained water breaks and half-time orange wedges, but overall I was very impressed with his progress.

We also learned that Eden liked playing defense. It required less running,which meant less sweating, and there was the added bonus of getting big cheers for stopping an on-coming goal. This initially made me terribly nervous, knowing that if it got past him he could be singled out as the kid who caused the team to lose. Luckily for both of us, his teammates were not those kind of kids. And even more fortunately, he turned out to be a darn good little defender! I still encouraged him to play up front once in awhile, but he refused. He found his niche, and he was staying put. Plus, he liked to strike these "I'm a big scary goal defender" poses, with his arms and legs spread wide and a growly-grimace on his face. I am fairly certain this did not have the desired effect on the opposing team, but it did make me smile.

I spent good portion of every game scooping Hannah up just before she ran on to the field. She felt very strongly that she should be allowed out there to play with her brothers, and she made this known. Loudly. During half-time I would attempt to appease her by ketting her loose to run around the field, which made her gloriously happy for those ten minutes.

Perhaps we should take these lessons to heart before registration in the fall......both the boys have already expressed an interest in taking karate instead. Still some kicking involved, but much less running. And its indoors.