Spring Soccer for Eric

Eric wanted to play soccer again, and since we were happy with the experience during the fall season, we went ahead and signed him up with the SA United club again. Anthony was with the same club when he was playing club soccer. We don't expect that Eric will automatically play soccer like his big brothers, but for now he enjoys it.

As you can see from the background, it was really foggy yesterday (Saturday) morning. Alex's high school soccer games overlapped with Eric's game, so Patrick was watching Alex's game and I was with Eric for his game. If Natalie had not injured her back, she would have had a swim meet also, so the injured back has been a mixed blessing. Patrick and I can still go to two different events at the same time, but we still have not managed to figure out how to go to more than two events at the same time. Natalie stayed home by herself to get some extra rest and to work on her school project due on Monday.

Eric was in a contrary mood. He has a gold SA United shirt that he wears for practice. This was the first game, so he didn't have his team shirt until we showed up at the field and got it. He is on the white team, named "Galaxy". All the teams have the same names as the MLS teams. He didn't want to take off his gold shirt, however. He wanted to put on the white shirt on top of the gold one. He also didn't want to remove his jacket, at first, at least until he was on the opposite side of the field and I couldn't hold the jacket for him. He also had a bad problem at first with a runny nose, so he needed tissues constantly. He got upset with me when I tried to help him. He said that I was holding the tissue too tightly to his nose (so I could catch the boogers) and that he couldn't blow out. Oh my. What a grump.

Luckily, he usually behaves for his teachers and coaches. There were eight boys on his team, so they all got to play half the time. They should have mixed them up a little, because obviously there were differences in playing ability, but oh well, they all got to play.

The other team was all girls. The girls all seemed way more coordinated and better at bringing the ball down the field, especially for one or two of them. I took this picture to show that Eric did participate, instead of just hanging back at the end of the long string of players running after the ball in almost single file. They still do that at this age. He did that too, but at least in this picture he tried to block a player from the other team from getting to the ball. He even scored a goal--for the other team. He did not realize that the teams had switched goals when he wasn't on the field playing.

This is the girl that scored almost all the goals for the other team. I am just tickled when I see this picture and the one above, when there is a very obvious size difference between Eric and the girls on the other team. Both teams are supposed to be made out of six and seven year olds. Girls just get bigger at an earlier age. Eric is actually trying to stop this girl from getting the ball. Go Eric!

I stopped counting score after this girl scored four goals. Their coach was even trying to get them to practice passing instead of one player just taking the ball the whole way down the field by herself. I heard one of the boys saying that they lost 2-13. I'm not sure it was quite that bad, but it was probably pretty bad. At least they all had fun. Eric loves playing soccer. Who knows, maybe he will decide to keep playing soccer like his big brothers. We're signing him up for baseball next.