This past Saturday, 25th of January I, alongside the rest of the SAISA girl’s soccer team 2020, had the amazing opportunity of playing in the exhibition game in the Neville De Alwis- Ralph Alles Challenge annual tournament which was played by St. Thomas’ College and Gateway College (boys teams).
It really gave us a feel of what it feels like to play on a larger field than the one we have at school and what it feels like to play with a larger audience (much like it’s going to be like in SAISA). It was overall a great experience, especially since we had such a great supporting team, many people from all grades came to support, just making it that much better, as they celebrated every little good thing we did.
I feel like this game not only taught us what playing a game is like with pressure, but it also taught us how to stick together as a team and bring each other back up again. I felt closer to the team this past Saturday than at any other time. It was honestly a great feeling.
As for the actual game, we played two 20-minute halves (it had to be shorter since it was an exhibition game), and we won in penalties. I know we could’ve scored goals throughout the actual game, we had many chances, but we defended very well and 9 out of 10 times had the ball in their box, centimeters away from scoring. However, we have had a group discussion and practice sessions in which we have talked about what we need to fix for further games and how to put it in the box more.
I feel more confident after the last game that if we continue like this, we have a good chance of placing well in SAISA. We will definitely have to put up a fight, but that’s what it’s all about 😉