As you all know, soccer has been my passion in the past few years. While I have been playing in my local league, Quincy Youth Soccer, for the past 3 seasons, I have wanted to step up my game to a new level. So, in the fall, I tried out for Quincy’s Travel team, the team that represents Quincy in competitive matches against other cities. Once we got the email saying we were on the team, we got our numbers for our jerseys. I got number 28. We then got the chance to participate in a pre-season tournament hosted at the Cohasset Sports Complex, an indoor field in Cohasset, Massachusetts. While it was fun, we did not start off well, and despite being a U-14 team, we lost to a U-12 team, that too by a large margin. We were not familiar with each other, and it showed in our sloppiness. While we got better through each game, we still finished with 2 wins, and we still had a long way to go. I was a little nervous about our state, but resolved to improve myself.
There were various training sessions we attended to improve ourselves. We slowly progressed and got better as a team in the weeks leading up to our opening game. Then, right when we needed it most, we hit our peak form. We won our first two games against Weymouth and East Bridgewater 6-1, with everyone working together in perfect harmony. We then had a tougher game against Hanson, but we won that 4-2. We had taken the league by storm, and were 1st in the league after 3 games. We then faced our toughest test of the season, against #2 ranked Sharon. This game was also our first home game of the season. While they only had enough people to field a starting squad with no substitutions, they still gave us an amazing fight. We won it by a slender 2-1 margin. It was an important victory, and we made a statement to the league, showing that we could compete with the best and also win games. We then had a small dip in our form, when we had a 1-1 draw with the team from Rockland, and a 0-0 draw with the team from Easton. However, we improved, and ended strongly, with wins over Sharon and Braintree, 7-0 and 3-0, respectively.
As we finished 1st in our division, we qualified for the playoffs. We went in happy, excited, and ready to book our place in the final. However, things did not go according to plan. We started off strong, and took the lead over Rockland 1-0. However, their team held a significant physical advantage over our team. They used this to their advantage, resulting in many reckless tackles. They then scored three goals without reply to win 3-1. While the scoreline does annoy me, considering that we were leading, what irritates me more was the refereeing. There were numerous plays where Rockland played overly-agressive, and fouls against them in which the referees called in favor of them, and some even showed support towards them. A few of our players, including myself, were badly injured (Notably, our goalkeeper got intentionally kicked in the face following their second goal, and had a large purple bump on his head, yet the officials did nothing about it.) and the refs, rather than penalizing the players who fouled us, gave our own coach a yellow card for going against their decision to keep playing. I find it sad that these kind of dirty deeds go on in this world, as it takes away the beauty of the game, and gives a bad impression of the kind of people playing the game, and the game itself.
While it was disappointing, it was still an amazing achievement to finish 1st and unbeaten, let alone making the playoffs, considering our sloppiness and vulnerability at the start of the season. Over the course of the season, I have developed myself better as a player, and a person. My coaches, Will Moore and Jeff Earnest, helped me believe in myself, and trust that what I’m doing is correct. I also discovered the position I will primarily play at. After I was made to play defense at the tournament in Cohasset, I made myself work harder to improve myself, and tried to improve how I defend, changing me for the better. I have also learnt many new strategies and techniques to aid me in games. Travel has helped me improve as a player, prepared me for playing more rigorous soccer, and taught me that sometimes, even if the game is not fair, you have to just keep going. I feel ready to take on high school soccer in the fall.
So, what do you think ?