Training Log Archive: Thompass

I see those little snowflakes flutter to the ground...they don't come in bunches, but in little, individual flecks, and I think...

Go away nobody likes you D:

Day one of rest. It's snowing. Pretty hard too, I think the forecast might be 1--3 inches....

Ready to relearn how to slip n' slide down the road (I'm kidding I know how to drive I won't go into the ditch this year I promise).

C • snow 5

Sectional semifinal, away again Eau Claire Memorial. They beat us the first time 4-0. They beat us the second time 3-1. But this was a different time they were going to face to day, in mind and spirit. Our bus was a little late, and at practice yesterday we felt a little flat, but as we warmed up with was obvious that we were ready to play.

The stands were full. Granted, most of them were ECM fans and parents, but Hudson had stocked up a comparable squad of fans. The crowd was arguably the biggest crowd I've played for, it was great. Their parents were roos, but you just expect that at this point.

The first half was difficult. They had the better of the play, and they possessed it patiently before launching an attack. They weren't clicking, and the ball remained outside of our net. That's not to say they were dominant. For every two or three decent chances they had, we would have a phenomenal chance. I got a left foot volley off in the box, but the keeper was just ready for it. They were playing dirty and got a yellow card in the first half. The half just flew byz and we were suddenly at half time. The scores were level, but a single mistake would tip the scales. Our half time talk is pretty enthusiastic, we're playing well and they're getting visibly frustrated.

The second half begins. We have the best of it, by far. We launch attack after attack, pinning them mercilessly in their half. The ref is making all sorts of shenanigans. They're keeper makes a mistake and physically tries to stop Paul from getting to the ball by tackling him. For some reason no foul, no penalty. Later there was a dangerous play in the box, but instead of giving us a penalty, we get an indirect free kick in the box. Kolton gets taken down two feet into the box but the ref insisted it was just outside of it. I don't know what it was, but this guy really didn't want to give us the penalty. Maybe he didn't want to influence the game in a major way with a penalty call, but that doesn't come close to justifying it.

It's the 82nd minute. Eau Claire has the ball on the right wing, but they don't look very sure about what to do with it. The winger settled on a cross and launched one in. It was a poor cross, but it deflected off of Santi, who was trying to block the cross from about a foot away. The ball spins off him and starts curving towards the net. The defense isn't prepared for it, their forward runs in and nods it with his head, and it's in our bottom left corner.

1-0, Memorial.

Our heads dropped for a millisecond, but then we were roaring. Every play was in our favor. We sent in cross after through ball after cross, looking for an equaliser that would save our season. We get more and more free kicks as Eau Claire throws their bodies at us, but the elusive penalty continues to escape us at the hands of the hesitant ref.

85th minute. They come forward through our midfield, but we step in their way and take back the ball. We launch the ball down the left wing, where Santi is waiting without a defender on him. He takes a touch, cuts it back, and, I swear for the first time ever in his life, crossed it. He crossed when our game depended on it. Despite never crossing before all season, there it was, in all its rate glory. Paul runs in at a slant, tries to kick it, misses, it hits his knee, pops over the keeper, and...

1-1.

The Hudson crowd erupts, just as loud as the Eau Claire dans were three minutes ago. They are not to be outdone.

The game is on. Eau Claire thought they were going to come out of this game just like they had come out of the last onesz but we were putting up a fight, a real fight. We continued to dominate, launching balls and free kicks for what seemed like ages, but the goal never came. 90 minutes came to an end, and we were on to extra time.

Extra time was two halves, ten minutes each, before penalties. We've been spending 10 minutes every day to practice penalties, and we were ready to pay back to Memorial what they deserved. We were going to take this game to the bloody end and put everything into it.

The first 10 minutes were nothing special, but one event stuck out. One play, while Kolton was attacking, their center back punched him in the throat to keep him from getting past. What a nice guy, right? He gets a yellow card...a second one. He's out of the game without a replacement, and this is a juicy chance to take the game by the horns.

Second half is full of spirit, we're all playing our hearts out. We get the majority of the chances, but they are possessing when they can and getting s fair share of crosses.


103rd minute.

You must be wondering how this is gonna go. They have a red, but they've won the last two games against us. Our we, technically the underdogs but we've been anything but so far, going to take this goal, or are the villainous fiends of Eau Claire going to take this? It all came down to a single mistake.

A player has the ball. He just stole it and his heading backwards towards his right back, but he is under heavy pressure from the defending team. He looks across to his right for an escape pass, and he locates one.

That's what he thought.

It was a blunder, the ball flies at the player's defence and they scramble to react to the disaster of a ball. The attacking player snatches it out of the air, pokes it past a defender, sees the goalkeeper coming out, and hammers it right into the back of the net. Half the stands erupt, and the defending team is left with their mouths agape.

2-1...



Memorial.

This is not how we are going to end the season. We did not fight tooth and nail for 110 minutes to go home, especially not against this team. We were playing better, and the slightest mistake had out us behind. The score did not reflect the play, and we were going to get one back.

We launch balls at them. Ball after ball. They're not even pressing anymore, not a single one of their players on 2/3 of the field. They don't care how ugly it looks, they are playing defense. They don't try to attack. If they get the ball, they kick it to our goal line and to the side. If they get free kicks or goal kicks, they are gonna spend 30 seconds pretending they're stupid to run down the time.

It works. We don't go to penalties. We lose 2-1. In the dumbest of all possible ways, our season is over. All it took was our player not making a dumb pass towards the center of our defense. It was a gift. It didn't help that we missed an indirect free kick, we didn't get any penalties, we couldn't convert free kicks...

It just didn't happen. It didn't work out. 110 minutes down the drain because of a silly mistake...

I hope you all enjoy this story. It was extremely intense in person, and I did my best to portray that intensity through writing. I'm on the bus back, just trying to keep my mind off the total devastation. Everyone is quiet. We're done. We're not playing together, at least not the seniors, ever again. At least not this group.

My focus is now on the running and orienteering season. It sucked. There are a few regrets. But things don't end with the soccer season. I need a fluid transition to prepare for upcoming orienteering events and general running routine. I'll probably take the next few days off to fully recover, I feel a little bit of wear and tear from the duration of the soccer season, I want that stuff to heal properly. Monday sounds like a good start day. Maybe short runs or biking this weekend to not be a total lazy idiot.

There's still like twenty minutes on this bus ride I can't write forever.

C • Outstanding... 9

It was windy af, playing was generally difficult.

I'll keep it short. Fragments.

Won. 2-0. Sam scored twice. Injured Ryan. Injured Kolton. Why so rude? I'm tired. Left knee hurts. Regional Champion. Play Memorial again. Two more games to state. Struggle. No more home games. Goalkeeper had a crazy last name. Lavastrava? Ramastrama? V S Ramachadran? Russian? Indian? Who knows. 30 yard free kick. Sam lost a contact. His parent went home to get him a spare one while he played with no depth perception. Two yellow cards per team. Ran. A lot.

C • Intense 3

Regional semi-final against Chippewa. They beat us the first time, we beat them the second time: the result was in the air.

We wiped the floor with them, 6-1. They're goal was the most bullshit goal I've ever seen. The ball bounced off the crossbar, our keeper was on the ground, and it bounced off his back. He turned and grabbed the ball before it crossed the line. Their forward ram over and tried kicking it out of his hands. He did t even succeed, Corey held on to it.
They called it a goal. Claimed it bounced off the crossbar and in then back out, which makes NO sense because it bounced off our keeper's back and he was several feet out of the goal.
Also, things got tricky when Chippewa realized they were losing hard. They didn't have much to lose, it's the end of the season. So, being the massive pricks they are, as I think I talked about in the game they beat us, they started injuring whoever they could. They kicked our left back in the ear while he was standing (think about that) and his ear started bleeding all over the place. They were all over our midfielder and we almost thought they broke his collar bone because his arm was in THAT position. They also hurt our forward's ankle, I don't know the details, but his season is probably over. Beyond that, one guy shoved one of our guys hard with both hands from behind, then for some reason was mad and got in his face. Another guy decked me out from behind and stood above me shouting that I should stop flopping. In a weirder case, their forward stuck a finger up our defender's butt. Thank goodness we never have to deal with those guys again, on to the next playoff game, #roadtostate

C • Refs 4

Off-day, felt kinda weird. Felt like I was holding something in, not physically comfortable, plus my shirt and socks got wet so I had to wear subpar shirt and normal socks. It showed, while not terrible everything was a little off, the shooting, the dribbling, the speed, the decisions... Hopefully it's better tomorrow

Is hard

C • Where? 6

Full game no breaks. Let me just lapse into a coma for a while.

Alright, spent most of the game on afterburners, good tho g those last a good, long while. We won 3-0 and we will probably get two home games in playoffs, seeding meeting is today. We played very well, we're peaking at just the right time in the season. I'm still stupidly tired tho a lot of the game seemed to be autopilot. Wasn't too bad tho, sometimes autopilot is exactly what you need, enough to get the job done while having a small spark of creativity. No need to go overboard.

C • good tho g 2

Last conference game and senior night, we beat North 4-0. Started a senior with a broken collarbone to give him an ovation from the crowd, nice moment although I don't know how I would feel in his position. He did the kick off and we immediately kicked it out. He seemed to be happy.

But yeah not a tough game but come on this team is so frustrating. No crosses from the wings it's soo dumb, and one of our guys will be standing 5 meters in front of me on the edge of the box and I'm shouting for him to drop it and he doesn't and he just loses it. Very frustrating. I was shouting for people to drop the ball all game,.late in the game I didn't do it because I knew he wouldn't drop it and the coach asked me why I wasn't asking for the ball. I might have flipped on him a little bit there but he didn't seem to mind.

Bleurgh I'll write more later.

If we win, we take second place. We were playing River Falls away, and although they aren't a very good team, they have a reputation to cause upsets when they play at home. Played most of the game and the entire second half, so the final ten minutes reminded me a lot of a long-distance race. Thighs were very tired. First half was 1-0, but they scored a few minutes after the start of the second half. It was partially my fault, I tried to head down a long kick but I didn't just high enough, it skimmed my head and went past our last defender. They had a fast forward and he scored.

We scored two more goals, so we got the win and guaranteed second place. The next game on Thursday decides what seed we get for sectionals. If we win, we have a good chance for second seed, which gets us two home games. Losing could drop us down to fifth seed, which is no home games. Big difference there, these games can be three hours away.

Eau Claire Memorial had a shocking loss on Tuesday, ending their undefeated streak, which could risk their first seed position. We have a game this Saturday that is pivotal going forward against Wausau West. Basically, they've asked us to win at all costs. If we win, Memorial gets first, and we get second. If we lose, Memorial could get second and we could land who knows where. It's a big game. Things are really getting down to the wire.

C • Bleurgh 4

Played less because unimportant game. Played pretty soccer, but we're clueless about how to attack, frustrating to watch

Incredibly rainy at one point, played winger for a bit but was a lot more comfortable when I went back to midfield. Lost 3-1 against Memorial.