"Stop being stupid, I will shit... Hit... Shit you!"

I refrained from making a post immediately after the game because of my mood. I was glad, but more or less in a state of disbelief.

Tonight was the quarter-finals for AFC Soccer. I went to the game, fully expecting to be benched for the majority of it. I wasn't. Our goalkeeper did not come, and Jahan wanted me to fill in. I'm not fantastic, but I can deal with corners well, and I'm not afraid to get hurt.

Jahan gives me the goalkeeper gloves, which were, and I wish I could make this up, a child's size right-handed "Hot Paw" glove and another right handed wool-lined canvas mitten. I declined use of them, opting for the good old spit-and-hands method instead.

We looked to be running away with it, in the first 20 minutes, leading 7-2. By half, they pulled a couple back on us. 7-4. No biggie, I thought, and the guys tried to raise my confidence at half.

After half, I had lost my concentration. I let a few muffins in, and they were back in it. That is when hell didn't quite break loose, but I certainly saw what it could be like.

One of our players (our top scorer) refused to leave the field. Jahan eventually grew frustrated, and pulled one of our own players "until he got off". At this point, we were up by just one. Jahan let somebody back on after about a minute, and then got on the field himself, yelling at the ref to take our renegade player out. He complied, and the other team complained.

Complaining's a bit of an understatement. The clock had to be stopped for about five minutes, while the other team yelled at the ref about not carding Jahan. I leaned against the post, trying to regain some of my confidence that had been lost when I heard "their goalie is their weak point! Shoot a lot!" from the opponent's bench a few minutes earlier.

We resumed play, and I went to punch a long ball that was put up for a shorter player in front of me. Turns out punching is not allowed in this league. What? I assumed the ref felt bad for me, as it wasn't a penalty shot, but rather a free kick just outside the box. They missed, after yelling at the ref some more. I think, that during one of the two kerfuffles, the ref was shoved by the other team, and then he began to take control of the game.

By this time, it was too little too late, and everybody had settled down for the last five minutes. A yellow was given for a high kick on our side, but we managed to shut them down long enough to hold out for the win.

I came home and watched Mantracker, because that was all I could do. My brain was just mashed to hell by the stress it had been under, and I'm still a little shaken, four hours afterwards. I probably would've shit my shorts had it gone into penalties.

It sounds a bit dramatic, but would you want to disappoint guys who pray before the game?

Tomorrow things are a little easier, aside from that essay I haven't started, due in six hours.

"Hey Ali, how many scores did you miss, a thousand?"

By Saturday night, I was crawling around the floor, speaking things that didn't make much sense, and in a general state of delirium. The crawling was based on the physical fatigue, while everything else was mental fatigue. I had played three games that day.

Normally, when I've played three games, it doesn't really get to me. I've done it a few times before.

But the arrangement and circumstance was the deadly aspect of it all. I went to bed the previous night at 4, woke up at 9 to drive my parents to the airport, and then had a game at noon with AFC Soccer.

Jahan pulled me aside and told me that I had raised my game once more, and I in fact did. I made few errors, created a few plays, and could've easily had a couple goals. The only error that comes to mind was failing to chest-and-then-volley a pass that would've created a 1-on-1 with the goalie, and there was really no excuse. Perhaps on a day with some more sleep, I'd have been able to hit it.

Aside from that, I had a lot of dangerous runs, a few dangerous and smart passes, and a couple where I almost could've scored if another player on my team decided to pass as opposed to beat the goalie in some manner. I am not complaining though, as we won 10-5.

After that game, I went home and relaxed. I had a White Eagles game at five.

At the game, I played defense. As an indication of how tight the footballing community is around here, the referee that took care of my noon match was also due to ref this match. Even stranger, though, is that the Eagles called up a couple players that one of the guys worked with, and it was a couple of old pals from Euro FC. For anybody not in the know, Euro FC was a team of Portuguese guys that won only one game, had terrible attendance, and was my team two summers ago. We practiced three times, and the great majority of them tired after three minutes of playing. They lacked speed and defensive abilities, but were somewhat decent in taking on men. Perhaps this sticks out in my mind because they did not pass, just tried to beat everybody.

Playing defense for the White Eagles is usually quite occupying, but tonight was an exception. We were playing a team that originally had no substitutes, so it game me license to move forward a little and provide a target that actually moved. More than once I had to pass it back to my own goalie because not a single striker on our team moved, and they had a man on right behind them.

I made one normally-suicidal attacking run forward, and managed to pass most everybody on both teams. I gave the ball to one of my Portuguese pals, and continued sprinting. He gave me a surprisingly excellently weighted ball to chase down, and I latched onto it with a touch or two. By this time, the opposition's goalie and a defender closed in on me, and the defender pushed me over. During the push, I was able to chip the bouncing ball over the oncoming goalie's head, and I was over by a foot. The ball bounced back, and by this time, I was on the ground. There was no whistle, so a rebelious part of me told me to play on. While on the ground. Which is normally illegal. Now, just try to imagine...

This, mixed with...

Wait, what?

Well, very basically, the ball bounced off the panel above the crossbar back to me while my back was on the ground. It took a bounce, and the oaf that bowled me over tried to clear it. He didn't. I bicycle kicked it while on the ground, and somehow scored. The other team complained, and I thought it wouldn't have counted either, but apparently it didn't count as a slide nor a high kick. I'll have to ask some officials at my next few games. It was easily one of my greatest goals to date. I'll have to make a list of them some day.

I've been working on a few other skills to suplement being lucky while on the field. One of them, the Trivela, is surprisingly handy given its asthetic value.

Sure, I can't hit it like that...

I took about a 50 yard free kick using this, and managed to pick out a head on the far post. Pretty good considering I didn't have much room to manuever. I put a ton of spin on it, too. I imagine this becoming a great tool for me.

Other than my personal performance, the Eagles game was routine, aside from the fact that we won 4-2. Most of our players played terribly, leaving HUGE gaps in the defense and not moving on offense. At half time, two of our players got in a fight because one wanted to switch sides as striker, and the other just told him to man up and put up with his defender, who roughed him up.

At least we got that elusive second win.

I grabbed some food after that game, then headed to the Coverall to play with Team Gigantic. We had a game against one of our friendly rivals and league leaders, Sabres. Strangely enough, they are only rivals because of Derek, who declared them so after he realized Greg on the other team and I were old pals on our high school soccer team. They creamed us the first half, 7-2. I was not into it due to fatigue, and the entire team played badly. In the second half, either they took the foot off the gas, we stepped up, or both of the aforementioned things happened, because we ended up losing the half 1-0. I personally played better at that point, as that was when runner's high seemed to kick in. I was able to beat people with ease, and have many shots, though few were on target. I also went a little crazy and laid down underneath the bench, which was a bad idea, but I wanted rest. All in all, we lost 8-2, but I did as good as I could, having very little sleep and enough rest time between games to make me feel like I was not tired.

It hit me later, at Jay's house, after we watched the taped version of last year's championship final, and after Matt and I decided to play some strange combination of pool and snooker with our hands, trying to bend the pool balls. Matt and I did this for about an hour.

I got home at four, let my dog out, then passed out. Big game tonight, though. AFC Soccer plays in the quarter finals of the championship at Skylight. I'm trying hard not to get nervous about it, but it's tough. Ahh well, at least it'll take my mind off that essay due tomorrow.

A Cantona-sized kick

It was as eventful as it gets yesterday, as far as soccer goes. I secured a couple tryouts for second division teams, then played three games while at Winnipeg Rec League, one of which was the championship match for winter indoor.

The two teams I'm trying out with are St. James Hurricane and Southport Aeros. I'm with the Arrows through a couple of players on the Ducharmes, and I got the Hurricanes tryout through I guy I was just chatting about with soccer. I can only pick one of those teams, and I'll have to weigh out the pros and cons to each. Right now, this is what I see:

The Hurricanes "need" midfielders. This means I could be playing one of my better positions, with more play time. Their requirement for midfielders tell me they could have had an exodus of sorts, which is generally bad. Also, I have heard that they may be a team new to the division. This either means relegation or promotion, which is not necessarily a bad thing, but in most cases is.

The Arrows seems to be a good team, and I know Ben and Jordan, who play with me on the Ducharmes. They're pretty good players. Their lack of need for players means I may not get in a good position (in spite of my constant yammering about how I can play every position, some are definitely easier than others for me), and regardless, there probably won't be as much play time. The biggest drawback, though, is that I'd be playing out of town. Two hours from my house, to be close to exact. Practices will be hard to get to on time, if at all, and half of the games would also be there. This also leads to one of the team's problems, which is that "there just isn't enough commitment to take it to the next level".

What a conundrum.

In the first game, I was playing defense as a guest player for a team called "Renaldo". I played pretty well and had some good clearances, but it was apparent that I hadn't played with them before. I aggravated my knee injury too by clearing a ball strangely, but I'm fine in general. I've been using it as an opportunity to practice with my left leg. We lost that game 4-1.

Then came the championship game. We were playing a team that is known for having decent players and a huge mean streak, and today was no exception. We put in two early on them, but they had equalized by the end of the half with two goals that were complete flukes, one was a shot that got stomached in, the other took an incredibly weird bounce off the boards and set a lucky player up for a tap in.

We pulled ahead in the second half thanks to a couple great breakaway goals, but all in all, it was not terribly exciting. I played terribly, possibly due to fatigue, and I remember somebody on the opposing team told their own players to watch out for my "cheap tricks". I pulled out the seal dribble and showed them what was up, and we ended up winning the match and championship by a score of 4-2. I should have just booted the guy who called my tricks cheap anyway.

I'd like to know what went through everybody's mind at the moment this was taken.

After the win, I couldn't have cared less as to what happened in the next game, which was for third place, with the Yellow Dogs. We lost, and I again played badly, possibly due to fatigue. We lost that game 3-1.

Three games in a day is tough.

"Move over, I need to snuggle up" ... "Oh god, he actually did it"

I realize that the updates are getting later and later, but it would seem that things are getting busier and busier.

Thursday I played with AFC Soccer, against one of the division's top teams. We had two subs and a terrible goalie who withdrew three fourths of the way into the game. We were losing by 5 or so when I went in net, and I actually made a few really good stops. Of course, I let some in, too.

Last Saturday was privy to another couple games, the first with Fury, and the second with Team Gigantic. Fury won 7-1, Team Gigantic lost 2-1. I scored the only goal for Team Gigantic, it was terrible. I rebounded my own shots until the third, where I just managed to squeeze it between the goalie's legs. Unfortunately, my goal got credited to Jay, so now he's two ahead of me in the standings.

At the Fury game, Jahan discovered my problem; ball control. He diagnosed me at half time, and then told me to run back and forth with the ball. I was clumsy at best. Time to find some ball control and dribbling drills. I imagine this will help my game a lot. I imagine it as the missing link in my game, as it should help my first touch, and my ability to beat people.

I went to the physio yesterday to check out that problem with my knee. Turns out I sprained my ligament between my fibula and something else. I just have to tape it up and I'm good to go. Actual rehabilitation on that starts next week, and after that, I'm getting her to take a look at my right ankle.

"Crouchy, when I look at you, everything tells me that you should be rubbish at football, and yet you're brilliant."

There were two playoff games for my Winnipeg Rec League teams tonight, The Ducharmes and the Yellow Dogs. They were both placed in the top bracket of four teams, so the same result in each game would have made each team play each other for the third time this season.

In the first game, The Ducharmes played the top seed, Red Bull. We went down 3-0, but I had pulled one back by halftime. I had intercepted a pass with a quick turn hitting the ball with the inside of my left foot, then behind me (which was the direction of their net) with my right. I turned in the process. This got one mark off me, but another came in from the left. I roulette'd him as well, in order to get around him. This put me at a tight angle with a defender on either side of me, but slightly behind. I used my arms to get some space, then fired a low shot into the inside side netting. A fantastic solo effort, it was. There would be no way to find anything like it on youtube, so I won't even try.

After a half-time resurrgency, my team pulled three goals back, and won the game.

The Yellow Dogs came into the gym with two men, and a boatload of ladies, so I sensed it would be a long game. I was not far off, sitting off maybe three minutes, and playing goalie for 5. In the first half, we had gone down a couple, but I showed signs of life with another fantastic goal that looked something like the next two goals mixed together, taking elements of Gus Poyet's actual strike and Rooney's placement in the net. The ball was bouncing towards their net, so I ran, got under it, and unleashed a fierce volley that almost sent the world in retrograde motion. I'm normally not one to brag, but man, did I ever hit that thing.

Wayne Rooney's goal.

Gus Poyet's goal.

One of the fellows on my team had a couple long spells out, and we began to slip. We eventually went down boatloads, because we were committing too much up front and not enough players were getting back, myself included. Things looked bleak, and they were. There was no chance we could win or tie it up, as they were up 13-2 (or so I thought). Somehow, my team showed signs of life, and we managed to score a handful of goals, two of them mine, in five minutes, making the score 13-7. I chipped one in when the goalie was on the ground flapping at it (my first chip goal, too, I enjoyed it), and then passed one into a corner thanks to a great pass to me in a 2-on-1.

Turns out I had thought correctly, and we ended up losing 13-7.

Though it was a great night, I ended up playing a lot, scoring a few fantastic goals, and doing a few tricks, some of which I didn't even think about.

In accordance to yesterday's post, I wonder, what should I try? Thinking more, or thinking less and just having automated responses? I'll have to try some things out, but I think thinking is a bad idea when trying to beat an opponent that is waiting for you. One that isn't though, is another question.

Also, have a gander at this, a fantastic summary of and solutions to the England national team's problems.

"I have one and a half cocks, when I start beating guys up you take five seconds. "

At half time on Sunday evening, Jahan had told me that I had raised my game a level for the last AFC Soccer game, but that I just wasn't performing with Fury that night.

I've found that I do have off nights, like anybody else, but lately, I seem to either be lacking form, or possibly just being too hard on myself. The strange thing, is that even if I am lacking form, I am scoring goals. I seem to be putting one in every other game nowadays, in spite of bad play.

It could also be that mentally I have reached a new level of play. This seems to be another likely case, as I seem to be thinking more on the field. This is both a good and bad thing, and I'll start by going over my previous approach to soccer.

There was a time where I would remember very little of the games due to sheer lack of cognitive thought I was giving it all. People would say things like "Do you remember that one foul you took? You hit the ground hard", but I would have forgetten it (at times making writing for this blog quite difficult). Even goals were sometimes hard to recall. As a continuous game, especially, there would be very little memory of possession or tactics in any sense. When I got the ball, I would not be thinking of how I would set something up, but it was rather a test of my ability to see things on the fly, and act accordingly.

With what seemed to be a program set in my head for all of this, I was able to play well in the co-ed leagues and low-level outdoor leagues, using my normally dominant speed.

But now I seem to be caught up somewhere. I think it's trying to incorporating moves into my game, which is an important part on any of Jahan's teams. Beating your covering man is paramount. I am thinking, now, and that it is slowing me down in getting past people. It happened twice tonight, where I just ran into two people, while my brain debating thinking about a move, or just peeling past them, though it did not help that I was tired, or that we were down so much that it didn't matter what I did. Before you guess, the White Eagles lost tonight, 2-9. More on that subject later.

There are a few possible reasons of why I can't just beat my man. Listed below is what I think about it all.

• I'm too accustomed to using my speed.
• I panic in front of defenders at times.
• I have little time for a touch in Jahan's teams, plus defenders are better.
• I lack the focus or concentration.

I'll have to find a way to remedy that.

In that Fury game, I had managed an assist by placing a through ball brilliantly with my left foot from about twenty yards away. This has been my best left-footed kick to date, and even the guy on the receiving end of the ball didn't know it was going to him (he had shrugged his shoulders at me when I had kicked it, then ran onto it). We ended up losing 4-1.

The White Eagles game was a mess though, as I mentioned earlier (A 9-2 loss). I scored our first of two goals while waiting for support, I eventually took advantage of a defensive error and ran right up the centre to score. I hadn't even kicked it properly, but it still managed to find the opposite corner of the net that I had originally planned to shoot at.

The funniest part of the game was when some guy nutmeg'd me, then I blocked him off from the ball. He yelled something that sounded like a ninja getting kicked in the stomach, ran into my back, and dove to the ground. Earlier, he had also elbowed me in the nose. I find it hard to believe that he didn't intend to, seeing as he's 6 inches shorter than I am. Asshole. My nose still hurts to the touch.

If that's how you want to look at it then sure. It'll be a "nice juicy little secret-revealing."

I dislike six o'clock games.

There are some good aspects about them, such as the fact that you have the rest of the night ahead of you, but for the most part, they give you little time to relax at the beginning of your weekend. As well, it doesn't help that the young squad of Team Gigantic is more accustomed to later games (me being part of those, though it could be a generalization).

Judging by my ranting, you probably could've guessed that we lost the game; we played abysmally. I don't think one member of our team had a good game by their own standards, including myself. We scored first (though I will admit, I was late; another reason to dislike a game at that hour), but then Academy (our rivals) had bagged four unanswered goals. I picked up a consolation goal in the last 2 seconds or so, and it was as strange as they get.

Jay had the ball, and decided to put a long ball in the corner for me. They goalie came out to claim it as it had bounced diagonally back into the field of play; it had hit the top of the corner wall section. The ball took a bounce on the ground, and hit it with enough force to place it inches over the goalie and his outstretched hands as he leapt to grab it.

The ball fell near where I was standing, so I took a few steps (I had been relatively stationary until this time) and lowered my head into it. It still had enough mustard to bounce off my head and into the goal relatively quickly, and as Derek said afterwards, "I saw the goal, and I looked at the clock. My head hadn't even turned fully and the buzzer went".

I came close to assisting another, as well. I had placed a perfect cross in, but a teammate did not flick their leg at it while they were in stride. They were about as easy as they come, and it was what I call an "idiot ball".

Yes, I realize that this is slightly demeaning (sorry, Derek), and that it does require a name change. Here's a picture that might make you happy. It was the first thing to come up on a google images search of "idiot balls".

The first thing to come up on a google image search of idiot balls.

Oddly, Academy was relatively friendly today. I got apologized to a couple times, helped up a couple times, and generally play was tame. As friendly as they were, the fact that they were playing the most terrible anti-football I've ever seen was not a nice thing for them to do to us (and me in particular, who ran between two defenders playing keep away for at least 7 or 8 passes). I can't really criticize though, because this is how I want the Eagles to play.

In spite of all this ire, I'm going to opt for some shut-eye, as I need to wake up in three hours for a snowboarding trip.

"How many coca-colas guys?" "It's COKES"

As usual, Tuesday was a busy soccer day. I played 3 games, tying only one of them, losing the others with a team I guested for and the Soccer Team, who played the Wannabees again. As luck would have it, the tie was between two of my actual teams.

I'm always given a rough time by the team I guested for, they say I always play against them. While there is truth to that, it is a gross exaggeration. We lost in the second half by a couple late goals (3-1), but kept the game tied for the majority of it.

The great thing about the Winnipeg Rec League is that I've been built up as a player to fear in that league, and that alone improves my game by mentally effecting the opposition before we even start the match. I play much better in that league than others, because people give me space to dribble; they fear closing me down to get burned (which is the opposite of what they should do). It also helps that my frantic style of play allows me to freely roam the small court, the distance of which is easily covered in a few short seconds. Those who've seen me play midfield in indoor will note that I don't often assign myself a role or position, but rather pick up various bits of slack around the field.

It helps in another way too, in that people pay particular attention to me in that league. This is how I helped get my team's goal. I made a diagonal run, and two people followed me, and everybody else glanced over in my direction. The run itself was not entirely productive, but it allowed my teammate to shoot and score between their goalie's legs from about 6 meters out; which is quite a distance with a size-5 ball and hockey nets as goals.

In the second game of the night, I played with my easily one of my favorite teams, "The Soccer Team". The Soccer Team is by no means a juggernaut, but rather a team of people (including a teacher from my old high school) who have rarely touched a soccer ball, but are in it for the fun. In all honesty, they are the least skillful team I have ever seen; however, they have copious amounts of fun all of which is incredibly infectious. As I've mentioned in previous blogs, I've heard oohs and ahhs from the bench after I pull something out of the style basket. This endears me greatly to them. When playing with them, I try to set up what usually ends up being a missed shot; I would love to see them grab a few goals for themselves, however. We lost 6-1 to the Wannabees (a former pseudo-team of minemisfits), but I did manage to set up the team's first goal not scored by myself. I ought to take less credit though, as I just rolled the ball to my former teacher for the toe-punt from Valhalla that practically ended the universe as we know it. I hope he mentioned it (and me) in the staff room.

If there's one thing I miss from youth football, it's the extremely powerful toe-punts that take the keeper five minutes to go find in the brush behind the field.

In the final game of that night, the Yellow Dogs and Ducharmes faced off. I played (once again) for the Yellow Dogs, due to a lack of male attendance. By this time I was pretty exhausted, and the LCL injury I sustained a few days ago began to act up. My lazyness showed from the first minute, when one of the Ducharmes, Jordan, went ahead and scored on us. They went up by two, but then a teammate pulled one back. Close to the end of the game, I got an indirect free kick in the attacking zone, so I just kicked it at the net, not having any options. It took a deflection and found the back of the net, tying it up 2-2. I felt a cocktail of guilt, elation, and empowerment. I didn't celebrate, though I'm not sure if that was out of grief or enervation.

Tonight, I answered the call of duty. Jahan called me at eight in the evening, asking me to come to the AFC Soccer game. I asked about how he got the team reinstated (remember that he had told me he had canceled it days earlier), and he fed me some incoherency. I had a choice to make: A White Eagles game, or the AFC Soccer game. I dangled the carrot in front of his face with this while weighing out my options*, but eventually told him I'd be there. It was unfortunate to be missing an Eagles game, especially considering that the game was against our rivals (who are based solely on both teams stewing at the bottom-of-the-divisional-system-barrel). They lost that game 5-4 after blowing multiple leads, it would seem from the online scoresheet.

I played the entire game on defense for AFC soccer due to a lack of substitutes, and I may have found my place in that team. I blocked many a shot, at one point blocking such a hard shot that I aggravated an ancient injury of mine, shown below. Question: What do you think it is? The answer at the end of this blog post.

Note: That is my shin bone, which normally should be relatively straight.

With that, I got to go in net for 5 minutes as a break. I let one in, but it didn't matter; we won 8-5 against a team twice our size. I got back out and started blocking more shots, slightly aggravating it again. I had a couple nice long passes as well, one resulting in a goal, the other was a perfectly weighted, lobbed through-ball from about 40 metres away. It unfortunately resulted in nothing, other than looking awesome. When I kicked it, I thought of David Beckham's new position/nickname with AC Milan, which is "Goldenballs". I chuckled.

And so after the game, the group of us went for a round of "coca colas" courtesy Jahan. We aggravated the server of our coca colas by calling them that. Many other odd things were said, including the establishment of the word "scores" meaning (and being used in the same context as) chances.

When I got home, I found my right leg has taken quite a beating, between the LCL, shin, and various ankle injuries I'm carrying. It reminded me of a favorite childhood game, Mechwarrior.

Anybody else experiencing extreme nostalgia? Note how intense the game must be, seeing as the background of the box is fire. Also, 31st century combat? Whoa, hold the phone, that is my kind of game.

In particular, whenever your "mech" would get damage, a robotic, feminine voice would alert you of the damage by mentioning that the particular part took a "critical hit". Since the injury, this voice has been reminding me of the "Critical hit; Leg" that I had sustained. This is a good indication that I am a loser, but in addition to that, this may my mind's outlandish way of alerting me that I need to settle down.

At any rate, this can't happen before Friday, Team Gigantic has a season-defining game against our most serious of rivals, Tony's Academy Autobody.

Answer: It is a break on the inside, or cortex of my bone. I am extremely thankful for the effects of calcium, and their salvation of the exterior part of my bone. This injury first began when I ran into a bench at full throttle while playing Basketball in grade 9 gym class. I sat out ten minutes, then began playing again. When I had heard that I almost broke a leg in quite a gruesome way, it began a streak of ego-inflation in thinking that I was made of adamantium or some other cool space-borne mineral.

"I guess I just have to marry you so I can be daughter-in-law. There's no other way."

I thought, the second I went down, that I was done. I took the Team Gigantic practice a little seriously, and ran hard for a ball that our goalie also ran hard for. We collided, and I heard a pop and felt quite a bit of pain in my knee.

Thankfully, I was able to continue playing 10 minutes later (and I scored a header goal). The next day, though, proved to be quite a labor, between stairs and general locomotion. My team also ended up beating the crap out of me. Literally too, in some cases (Thanks, Jay).

Before the practice I have a game with Fury. I made an assist and we tied the game 6-6. I played horribly.

Yesterday, when I spoke with Jahan, he spoke to me of canceling the AFC Soccer team mid-season because of commitment issues. I'm skeptical about the truth behind this, but he is known for being somewhat strange when it comes to these things.

It's that combination of stupidity and arrogance...

The Eagles had a game Monday, and it was about as frustrating as it gets.

We lost 5-2, but I did end up assisting one of the goals. Oh yeah, and I got fouled a lot too. Many of them in great spots for free kicks, but I was always told to "Get in there". Too many times all my hard work dribbling resulted a rough foul and the free kick going out of bounds right off the kick. I got to take none of the kicks, too. There were too many times I was open on those set pieces, but the kicker vouched to shoot. Christ, I am getting sick of all that. And then, to top it all off, the team tried to convince me to run the outdoor contingent in the locker room. I declined, in spite of many convincing arguments, such as "come on" and "you can do whatever you want with the team". The later is a lie, as well, because nobody bloody well listens to anybody as it is.

The Team Gigantic game the next night was the complete polar opposite of the Eagles game. We were playing Superfriends, a team that normally threatens our win record. It was a tight game, but I had a beautiful first half brace that gave us the 2-1 win. The first goal was a one-timer from an awkward angle, and the second was a chested down throw from Shaun that I took through three people them put in the top right section of the net. I also ended up megging pretty well, he looked kinda stupid after it.

We did well, and even Keeley and Alaina came out to play. They've never played soccer before, but they did great, especially compared to my expectations for them.

Apparently, in a Ducharmes game that I omitted to go to in favour of the Team Gigantic game, the other ref and his team were being idiots. So now I have to do something about that... Christ. Never a dull moment.

After the Team Gigantic game, I went to ref. The Yellow Dogs played at nine, and they stuck me in goal for the first half.

In spite of my self-sacrificing drive to prevent balls from entering the net, I'm still not the greatest goalie, and I let in three. I did make a really good save where I palmed the ball into the crossbar, though. When I got out of net, I scored two - both sloppy one timers. We lost 6-5, and one of my teammates kept complaining about "having no firepower up front" after one of the other guys went in net. This is weird, the half I was on we scored 4 as opposed to the previous 1. I almost finished a Messi-esque run through four people, but unfortunately couldn't get past the goal keeper.

Be sure to turn on High Quality.

"Orphans fit well into suitcases."

I had a much-needed rest these last few days, but after sliping down Keeley and Alaina's stairs, I sprained my ankle. I managed to shrug it off before the game with Fury. We ended up playing the top ranked team, and lost narrowly, 5-3. By halftime, the game was 2-3, and then I scored shortly after off a rebound. The other team retaliated, and I had the opportunity to even it up with another rebound shot, but didn't kick the ball, as another team mate behind me tried to kick it as well.

Jahan spoke of chess and horseracing afterwards, none of it making too much sense, but the points were taken: Focus on my confidence and dribbling.

In practice, my dribbling's not half bad, so I really just think it's my confidence that is lacking.

At any rate, I have to go to school at 8:30 tomorrow, so sleep is of the utmost importance. Stay tuned for games every night until Wednesday.