Soccer Preseason Journal: Part 5
8/17/2005 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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As I learned in my Psychology 101 course, the stereotype for northerners was to be blunt and tell people things as they see them. Being from Buffalo, New York, I fall into this category and stereotype and my entry today shall uphold that belief.
Today was not the best day for Alabama Soccer this 2005 preseason. Despite hydration attempts by Sherry (our trainer) I really think the sun and heat are starting to take their toll on the team. A passing warm up in a big grid with three teams started off the practice. Next the team went through wall passes to a long outlet pass that was laid off for a shot. Then the person who laid the ball off spun out and obtained a pass from the goalkeeper and had only two touches to shoot the ball on a nearby goal. The drill was very simple but the passes weren’t as clean as they should have been.
After that, we went to the net to work on crosses. We finished driven balls on the ground, at knee length, flighted balls and then any ball the crosser wanted to hit. This is a great drill for our team because last season we lost a lot of close games, or tied games because we could not seem to simply tap the ball in when it came across the goal. There were some “Dun-nah-nah’s” or “Sportscenters,” plays worthy of making the show’s Top 10 list, and the drill was ended by an excellent finish by sophomore Hayley MacDonald.
The team then ran fitness, which was a race of sprints between seven teams of three people. It was great to see the speed of our goalkeepers and the fact that people, like freshman Kailey Corken, were willing to do baseball slides to get across the line first. This fun activity was cut short due to lightning and the afternoon practice ended.
The scrimmage started off well tonight. However, due to lightning in the area the team had to repeatedly stop play and could not get into any sort of rhythm. Coach Staley started to implement set pieces into practice. Don’t quote me on this, but I think the statistic is that 60% of all goals in college soccer come off of restarts, so they are pretty important! Being the first time that this squad, especially the new freshmen, have had a look at the plays, some of them didn’t work too effectively at first. They will undoubtedly get better with repetition and will be beneficial for us starting August 26th when we open against Tulane in New Orleans.
That is it from my side. I think the song of today is “Tomorrow” from the musical Annie. Tomorrow the team will be better. You can have one mediocre practice, but having two is unacceptable!
Until TOMORROW,
Emily Pitek
ROLL TIDE!
