Preseason Soccer Journal: Part 4
8/16/2005 12:00:00 AM | Soccer
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EDITOR'S NOTE: Alabama junior defender Emily Pitek will give her account of the Crimson Tide’s pre-season work in her diary each day leading up to the beginning of the season.
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Practice today was another scorcher. We might as well have been playing in the Sahara Desert, seeing as the heat index was 118 degree! Regardless, the brave, relentless and extremely sweaty soccer team was out in the heat practicing from 2-4.
I was lucky enough to be asked to help the goalkeepers in their training by our coach, Shanna. Her main focus for her keepers was trying to protect the near post when the ball is served from the endline. After a few reps, Shanna and I switched roles as server and finisher and she began kicking the balls at the keepers. I think she might have had too many chats with our other coach, Jerod Hall, about being in the Army because she was in sniper mode when she kicked. She drilled a ball that hit the ponytail of freshmen Karen Lansden that prevented the ball from going in the net. Then she hit a ball driven to the back post. While I was standing at about the 6-yard line, I turned my head to the back post to see where the ball had gone. Before I was able to completely turn my head the ball had ricocheted off the post and had come screaming at the left side of my face.In a failed attempt to dodge it, no thanks to my poor reaction ability, it took me out. My feet went flying, my body was suspended in mid-air and some sort of battle cry protruded from my mouth...I had been hit. Luckily, for all parties involved, I was able to get right back up, after of course being doubled over from laughing, and we continued the drill.
While this was happening, Coach Barnes was busy running the rest of the team through station training with various 1-v-1, 3-v-1 and 2-v-2 games. It is always funny trying to see strikers defend and defenders trying to beat someone off the dribble. It was good though to push people out of their comfort zone and to do things they normally don’t do. Then we did my favorite offense-defense drill where 3 defenders try to prevent the offense from scoring. It really makes the defense talk and shift effectively. It also challenges the offense to find the unmarked player in order to score a goal.
When there was a water break, the freshmen around me asked if they were going to have to run the obstacle course that was behind the net. I said, “Yeah, but we go under the low bars and jump over the high bars.” Being the gullible characters they are, they believed me and were shocked. Then it came time for them to actually run it and they realized that I was in fact kidding. Everyone showed great agility, especially running through the human pole part!
After practice Alan Ward from FCA came to meet the team and provided us with juicy watermelon that cooled everyone off a little bit! This is why today’s theme song is “Watermelon Crawl”. We then gathered back at 7 p.m. for our scrimmage. It started off pretty well but after a while the game just got a little sloppy. Fatigue had started to set in. Coach (Don Staley) stopped the scrimmage and ran the team through some fitness. He reminded us that we may be tired from training in the heat, but all the other teams in the SEC are training in the same conditions.
After a cool down and some ice we were treated with a feast from under the sea. Salmon, grilled tuna, boiled shrimp and some Cajun treat (I’m sorry, I’m from the north, I forgot what it was called) filled the stomachs of everyone with great delight!
With full bellies and tired legs another day of preseason was complete.
Until later,
Emily Pitek
ROLL TIDE!
