FREE KICK

Excerpt from my new novel: NO ONE TO PLAY
 
DOME 4, Republic of California, 2057
 

Tanner stood and stared at the ball, he looked up and narrowed his eyes, calculating the distance to the upper right hand corner of the goal: 35 yards 2 and a half feet and maybe an inch or two. The distance was a critical factor, 35 yards was easier than 18, he still needed distance to make the ball do what he wanted. Only the Masters could hit this kind of ball up over a wall of defenders from 18 yards and into the net. It was written that Saint Ronaldo once executed this kick from a distance of just 12 yards but then many of the old writings were passing into the stuff of legend. Stadiums of 100,000 people were unlikely in a hungry world.
 

Tanner was aiming for a space that was only fractionally wider than the diameter of the ball and the ball would have to dip and swerve before it reached that space traveling the distance at an arrival speed of 85 mph. He looked back down at the ball and in his mind spoke softly to it as he would to a departing loved one. I love you, he thought, you know that, I’ve always respected you, even when you taunted me with your bounce, your unexpected bobbling, your skidding off the side of my foot when I was trying to kiss you with my laces, despite all this I’ve loved you, since I was a child. Now it’s time for you to leave. I hate long goodbyes so … he ran five paces toward the ball, planted his left foot next to it, and swept his right leg down in an arch that terminated its follow-through just as he struck the side of the ball.
 

His leg whiplashed spin into the ball and the ball leaped away like a scalded cat. It rose, accelerating toward the middle of the cross bar, far from the sighted corner, looking for all the worlds as if it would simply fly directly over and miss the goal. But 4 feet from the goal it dipped sharply and swerved violently to the left, hit the 90 degree angle where the cross bar met the post and bounced in a high, lazy arc to drop and roll to a stop almost halfway the distance between Tanner and the goal. He threw his head back in exasperation and bared his teeth at the stars that laughed at him from the other side of the dome.

A RECREATIONAL LEAGUE

I coach Under 8s in a “recreational league”. We play 7-a side, 4 x 15 minutes quarters, no offside, no direct free kicks or penalties. This is USA, after all, where we still cling to making the game different from the rest of the world whenever possible.
 
Mondays and Wednesdays we practice 1 hour. Saturdays we play games, sometimes back to back double headers. 10 games in with a 9-0-1 winning record I can tell you that for me there is nothing recreational about the experience. The league commissioner tells all the coaches it’s about the kids having fun, not winning, that ideally all games should end in a tie. Okay. Whatever I tell myself, I want my kids to win.
 
On the freeway I worry about blowing a tire, breaking down, being late, not getting that vital player card to the referee before kick off and so forfeiting the game 1-0.
 
Once I’m on the field, usually alone, with the team banner set up and my son Vincent sleepily kicking balls at an empty net, I begin the wait. The wait for the other parents to show up with my players. Where are they? Why the hell haven’t they let me know if they can’t make it? I sent them a reminder email, a Google map link to where the field is, even an aerial picture with the ground clearly marked, for Dempsey’s sakes!
 
I check my text messages. I check my voice messages. One of my star strikers, a young boy of remarkable talent and potential had a fever yesterday. Is he okay now? Even if he is, how much stamina will he have? I tell myself if the minimum 5 players don’t show up I’m fine with forfeiting the game. The heck I am. I tell myself to calm down, they’ll be here any second now.
 
At the coaching certification seminar I was told to actively engage the help and participation of the childrens’ parents. What, are you kidding? That doing so would forge a special bond between the kids and their parents. What are you, nuts? Which “How To Be A Ranting Parent and Raise A Monster Who Wants To Take Over The World” parenting book did you read that in?
 
This means that at any given moment I have at least 5 parents and an assistant coach simultaneously yelling instructions at the kids. Luckily I have a louder voice than all of them put together. Plus the kids know that I am, at least nominally, the boss. So what do I yell? Well, encouragement way more than instruction. My main instruction lately is simply “Watch the ball. Always know where the ball is”. I yell praise and never, ever criticism. I have to deal with several parents, almost always guys, who know better than me what their Mini-Messis and Ronaldos need to be doing.
 
I have to make sure every player plays at least half of each game. I have to deal with the guy who tells me I should play his daughter as a striker when she spends most of the game watching airplanes, dogs, kids on the nearby playground or inspecting her fingernails. But in between occasionally confusing them by mixing up their names, I also have the joy of watching kids figure out for themselves how, when, and where to kick the ball
 
Seeking feedback, I asked my son what was the one thing he hears me yell most often? He thought for a moment and said, “Nothing. When I’m playing I’m focused on playing, not listening to you guys yelling.”
 
There, I always knew I was the indispensable central cog in that winning machine.

The Latest #9

Ironic contrast. Today at soccer coaching for his U8 league, my son was issued his soccer uniform: jersey, shorts, and a spare pair of socks.

My son’s team has a custom designed crest.

As a registered U8 coach PAL Metro League gave me a ball bag, 5 balls, a soccer field dry erase clipboard. I spent $40 on Amazon tonight on other coaching supplies.

This kid’s team seem to have a biro pen as well as (maybe) a ball. I bet they have passion for the game and skills to make up for all the other “stuff” they don’t have.

But I guess at the end of the day the most important thing is that wherever they are, whatever their circumstances, children all over the world are united in their love of the game.

PLAYING IN THE DARK

Last Saturday night at the San Jose Earthquakes v Colorado Rapids game there was an electrical problem at creaky old Buck Shaw Stadium. (San Jose’s brand new stadium opens 2014). There was some doubt as to whether the floodlights would work. The game kicked off with about 20 minutes of daylight left.
 
I imagined the ground staff running out and slapping a couple of coats of fluorescent paint on the goal posts and the game continuing with a glow in the dark ball. Maybe not as crazy an idea as it might at first sound.
 
Given the team’s inability so far this year to score enough goals to win more than 3 games (3-4-6) maybe San Jose Earthquakes head coach Frank Yallop could start some in the dark training sessions. Remember that scientific study of Ronaldo where he scored 3 goals in total darkness?
 

 
Maybe that visualization technique coupled with some lights out training might sharpen things up in front of goal. Couldn’t hurt!

HUNGFELLOWS

by Man on the Spot (of bother) – Luke “Jimmy” James
 
Sir Luke Jimmy James here, your man on the spot (of bother) in the heart of the Valley of the Soccer Gods. I’m currently parked in a Skoda, in a handicapped parking space, outside a highly secret facility. Acting on a tip from a reliable Twitter abuser, I think I’ve managed to locate the Soccer Gods Excessive Behavior Training Centre. It’s cunningly disguised from the outside to look like a London nightclub. The sign over the door says, “Hungfellows”.
 
If my information is accurate, this is where superstar players fresh from the factory of the Soccer Gods, get their final training in excessive public behavior. A player’s ability to plumb the depths of disgusting and despicable acts, and then recover to play brilliantly again (or not), has become an essential part of the modern game.
 
Okay, time to go in, feet first over the top of the ball. I’m disguised as a drug dealing pimp, three-piece Armani suit, Rolex, backstage pass for “Britain’s Got Talent”, and a mail order knighthood from Her Majesty the Queen of England. This baggie of coke and a fistful of dollars should see me past the bouncers and their seven-headed serpent, Hydra.
 
Tempted by a couple of lines, the bouncers turn out to be quite friendly although Hydra hoovered up the rest of the blow! That’s fourteen nostrils for you, I guess. I’m currently hiding in a stall in the Gents, my underpants wired for sound, my tiny camera fully primed. I’ll just slip this surreptitious periscope, handily disguised as a pair of stocking-clad high heels, up over the edge of the stall door and take a squint.
 
And we’re in luck already! Here come a couple of players I remember seeing back in the racist and abusive vocabulary department at the factory. It’s Terryitus, and he’s dressed from head to toe in a blinding white outfit. It’s hard to tell with the glare, but that looks like Suareziticus right behind him. He’s yelling something at Terryitus about biscuits and geese … no, crackers and honkies. Now he’s expressing a desire to take out some white trash. What a tidy striker!
 
I’m out on the dance floor now and the noise is almost unbearable but then so is the dancing! Jesus H. Ronaldo is the only one who has rhythm, as he twirls and pirouettes across the floor but oh no! He’s passed too close to an anorexic supermodel and he’s flopped down! The trainers sprint to him along with his drama coach.
 
The potato-headed god, RooKneeintheBollox, is indeed here but as you might expect, he is heavily disguised wearing an “I’m Not Really Here” t-shirt, and invisibility shades sold by the well-heeled brand, Emperors Clothes. His ensemble is rounded out by a tasteful, large lapel picture badge of his plain but faithful wife, and their seventeen children. It’s an outfit that perfectly compliments the five grand a sniff call girl he has on each arm.
 
I’ve trailed the zigzagging party of reveling superstars back to the Hotel Olympus and am currently in the corridor outside the Nirvana Suite disguised as an Ikea dumb waiter. Several player-gods have already tried to order drinks from me and earlier the English Football Association Chairman offered me an England national team management contract but backed off pretty sharpish once he saw my “Made In Sweden” sticker.
 
What’s that noise? There’s a stampede of player-gods, supermodels, chickens, drug dealers, sacrificial managers, and goats boiling down the corridor towards me. Looks like they’re being herded by of a posse of paparazzi.
 
Quick run!