This is an open letter to my beloved Amazon Warriors. I thought I should write this before reviewing our last day at ACAMIS. That historical day will be posted soon.
My Amazon Warriors,
We made it! After the most intensive two and half months of football we come to the end of our journey. You girls have no idea how happy and proud I am with each one of you. We overcame so many obstacles like IB, injuries, lack of practices and we broke all records that previously existed.
What else can I say to the perfect team? To the team that never gives up. To my invencible warriors? What makes me happy is not only the titles but seeing your happiness after each victory, after each championship. It was an unique learning experience. We worked as a solid team with people that we are not necessarily close to and we put differences aside and conquered the world.
Our season is unquestionable. We faced the best teams of our league and we beat them. I remember three years ago in Taiwan when we had to play against the mighty team of BISS Pudong that I was more worried not losing by much than actually winning. Look at us now. Our last three matches against them we won, and playing at their own field! This team brought the SCIS Hongqiao name to a level of respect in the league that few teams ever had.
Girls, I know I can be rather emotional and exaggerated but let’s face our numbers. We won our league with 100% of points. We hadn’t lost a single point in 13 matches. In total we played 23 matches; lost one, tied one and won 21 matches. We scored the absurd of 113 goals and suffered the measly 10 goals. It’s an unprecedented average of 4.9 goals per match, and this is counting tournaments with 40 minutes matches. Do I need to say more about this team?
In our chat before the finals I told you how I would like to perceive this season in our lives; I want you girls to be proud of what you had achieved. So proud that in the future, when you have your own kids you can bring back those memories and tell them that once you were part of a team that played by music, prolific goal scorers and that there was no battle we were afraid of facing.
I will miss our practices. I will miss our happiness before and after matches. I will miss the drama of injuries or miscommunications. I will miss all of you. In the individual letters I wrote to you I already left my personal message to each one of you. I have no words to thank you for your dedication and commitment to this project. I am a better coach thanks to each one of you and I hope this time we spent together, either one season or to some of you three long years, I was able to help you being a better athlete and a better person.
Next year some of you are facing a new journey in your life away from SCIS, some of you will not be able to play due to other priorities. I hope you all be extremely successful in the next step of your lives. What I can tell is that you girls are now one of my stories that I will tell years to come and it starts like this: “Guys, let tell you a story! Once I had this amazing football team. 13 girls that won it all. They got the triple crown. They were my Amazon Warriors….”
Thank you for everything.
Yours,
Coach Pessôa