Update 9-12-05

The Red Dragons made a strong showing during our second game, with only a few miscues against what seemed to be a larger team. In fact, the ball seemed to be down at the other end of the field for most of the second half and only the vigorous efforts of the opponent’s goalie kept the Dragons from scoring.

If you have any photos from the game, please send them to me and I will forward them to the rest of the team and also post them on the blog.

A special thanks goes to Alice Wilson for designing a ferocious Red Dragon banner. Can/did someone volunteer to serve as ‘team parent’ to manage collections for all of the items related to banner/snack/end of season party, and their associated cost? Let me know, please.

Two defensive areas we will work on during this week’s practice include 1) Never retreat with your back to the ball -- watch the ball at all times – and 2) as a defender, stay between the ball and goal. On offense, we will work on longer shots and longer forward passes rather than pure dribbling.

Changing subjects, we have a logistical complication for which I could use your patience. Since we have ten players on the team, a couple of girls will end up sitting out two quarters during games when everybody shows. I will do my best to make sure that if your daughter is out two quarters during one game that she will play three quarters the next game.

Believe me, I know everyone wants to play as much as possible, but – as I discovered last Saturday -- this rotation is simply a function of the math of having seven players on the field at a time but ten on the roster. Please work with me on this. On hot days, it will probably be for the best in any case.

Don’t forget practice at 5:30pm on Tuesday, and our game is 11 am this coming Saturday.