So here we are. The best from the west vs the best from the east. Both teams undefeated in the league and in the tournament. While we came from a good match against BISS Pudong (1 x 0), Dulwich tied against BISS Puxi and went to Penalty kicks. Last year we faced them at ACAMIS twice and we tied twice (on the semifinals, we won on the extra time). I’ve watched the first half of them playing against the French School and I’ve felt they were good but not unbeatable. The French School gave them a hard time. It was a challenge but we could beat them and if we really wanted to be the best team in Shanghai, that’s what we needed to do.

We started the match with our traditional starting line up with Bella, Mikayla and Tehillah, Inês as center midfield, Alice on the right and Kyra on the left and Franziska as our striker. The game started well balanced and we actually had the first shot at goal with a slow shot from Franziska at the 2nd minute of the game. Dulwich attacked and unfortunately our Wonder Alice got hurt, hitting her head against an attacker from Dulwich but still Kyra was able to pull a counter-attack where Franziska was one-on-one against a defender and unfortunately shot the ball out. I had to call my Happy Swedish Alva to come in and actually that was great for the team, as you will see soon.

The next 10 minutes was stressful with no team actually dominating the match. We had some chances, they had some. I have to say that this was the first game that someone actually shot a ball towards Bella. We had good chances also with a beautiful shot from far away from Kyra.

Then on the 20th minute what never happened this season, ended up happened. On a side throw, Alva deflected a ball to the middle, their player 14 shot a ball, Tehillah jumped and hit her foot, changing the trajectory of the ball and fooling our Swedish Black Spider. 1 X 0 Dulwich. Seems that the only way to score on Bella is if the ball hits one of our players. It was like that last year during ACAMIS and happened again here. Before that, the only goal we suffered this season was from a Penalty kick.

Now was a moment that made me proud. My captain Inês went to the goal, picked up the ball, and calmly walked to the center of the field, repeating the gesture of Didi, the captain of the Brazilian team in the final of the World Cup of 1958 against Sweden. This calmed down out team and gave us time to cool down and get our minds into the game. I knew with two more minutes in that half, there was not much that it could be done but just avoid them scoring another goal. I normally don’t brag about myself but I have to say something here. At that moment, Dulwich had a corner kick and I called Franziska to talk to her, already preparing for the 2nd half. if you pay attention on the audio of the video, at 20:45, you will hear me saying: “Take your time, it’s gonna be your match”. I have to say that our German Panzer is being almost a perfect striker this season. She runs, fights for the ball, is fast and the only flaw she had last year, she improved a lot this one, which was the precision in her shots. It’s been awesome! When she needs to rest, Hail Gribble! comes in and shows why she is also one of our best athlete in all sports.

On the last minute, a scary moment. We were attacking and a ball was deflected to our defensive side. Tehillah trapped it nicely and went to dribble their #14. The #14 stole the ball from Tehillah, who fell straight on her face. Normally I would not worry about my Indestructible Dutch but this time, she was limping. At the same time, our solid defender Mikayla was able to brilliantly slow the Dulwich counter attack, giving time to other players to come back. I decided to take Tehillah out, for the first time in the tournament, so she could rest and I could access the damage. Greta got in under an immense pressure, in a final match against a strong team with us losing. It’s not an easy task at all. First half was over. Time to talk to my team.

I’ve told them to simply calm down. I’ve told them that we are the current champions, we are the team with best record. They should be the ones afraid. All we needed was one goal. I was sure if we went to penalty kicks we would win. Just calm down and play our game. That’s all we needed. Be well positioned defensively and push forward. We have to have a presence at the attack so we could hold them off.

The first five minutes was only Hongqiao pressuring. Franziska had three shots already at their goal. At the 8th minute was Kyra’s turn to have a nice shot from the left side. It was almost a replay of our semi-final against the same Dulwich last year during ACAMIS when she scored the winning goal.

After that, something very weird, which I never saw in my four years of coaching here in Shanghai happened. They subbed their goalie for another player that was already in the field! This spent around 3-4 minutes doing that. Luckily we had a very good referee that actually added this injury time later, which made ALL the difference as you will see. Almost also as a punishment for that, at the 11th minute of the second half, our German Panzer scored the impossible goal. After fighting for the ball between three Dulwich players, from almost the sideline on the right side,  she shot a ball on the extreme opposite angle of the crossbar and pole. Not even Roberto Carlos would do that. Take a look on this picture to see where Franziska was. It’s insane! 1 x 1.

From that moment on, I knew that the match was ours. Our spirits were high and we started to press Dulwich back even more. Kyra had a great shot saved by the goalie and Franziska shot more two great balls at their goal. Even if ended tied, I was feeling that this SISAC was ours.

With 8 minutes and a half to end the match, I took Kyra and Franziska out and put Suh-Young and Hailey in the match. The idea was to inject fresh blood and also to rest both my Glass Head and German Panzer for our penalty kicks. I was planning on having them back in the game with 3-2 minutes to end for exactly that purpose. Then something wonderful happened. Alva just deflected a ball on our defensive system. After less than a minute she was already close to their goal box and guess what? Their defenders deflected a ball that hit Suh-Young and fell on her lethal right foot. I guess her Viking blood from her ancestors have her enough energy to drive such a powerful shot that made impossible to their goalie to stop. You have to understand, this girl was on fire! Running everywhere, defending and attacking non-stop since she got in the field. From now on Alva is my Happy Viking. Way to go girl!

So, what we need to do in a final match, with 7 minutes to end, winning 2 x 1? We have to position ourselves very solid defensively. Like, almost everybody back. I mean, REALLY back. Guess what happened? They scored right after the free kick. Their #21 passed through Alva on the left side and was able to pass by Tehillah, crossed and by such unlucky situation, Suh-Young tried  to deflect and scored an own goal. No blame on her at all. The ball hit her knee and died inside our net. Seems that Bella is cursed with that since last year she also suffered only own goals against Dulwich. 2 x 2

Then the coach from Dulwich said something that shook me to the core. She shouted to their girls : “Come on girls! You are undefeated”. Wait a second. WE are the undefeated team. We don’t lose since April 14th 2012. I have players in my team for two years that don’t know what is to lose an official match. Besides that, we were 2 x 2. I was still confident that we would win at least on the penalty kicks. But silly me. I don’t have a team, I have a squadron. I have a group of fierce Amazon Warriors who never gives up. Instead of being shaken up what did we do? Attack.

And it was only us. Attack vs defence. With 4 minutes left on the clock, Kyra and Franziska went back and my German Panzer was impossible. She wanted this match more than anything. with three minutes to end the match she forced Dulwich goalie to make an awesome save. With the official time over, you can hear me shouting in Portuguese to Inês :”It’s over! It’s over! Let’s get the ball and push forward”. I sincerely just wanted to keep the ball away from Bella but I guess Franziska had a different idea. In the injury time (23rd minute of the second half), Kyra passes to Inês, our Portuguese Brain finds our German Panzer sprinting to the attacking field. She sees with the corner of her eyes the goalie coming out of the goal and with a gorgeous little touch, takes it out from her hands. 3 x 2 SCIS! Our German Panzer, with her surgical accuracy, saved the day from penalty kicks. After that, only one more minute and then voilá! Twice in a row SISAC Champions.

So now here I am, happy as a coach can be. With no voice whatsoever and extremely proud of my 14 Amazon Warriors. Special thanks also to our “veterans” Katy Ni and Marta Casanovas who came to support and help us a lot! Lily Briggs who filmed many matches and was there today to support by taking wonderful pictures of our team. Above all, thanks to the parents who were there constantly supporting the whole team. I am forever grateful for allowing me to train your daughters. There is no question that you raised them amazingly well and your support for the “wonderful game” made them champions.

I definitely deserve a sip of a delicious Port Wine from a harvest of 1972 that I’ve been saving. For my girls, here is what I have to say; enjoy this achievement. We won EVERY SINGLE MATCH IN SHANGHAI. There is no question who rules this city. Shanghai belongs to the Amazon Warriors. Shanghai is ours… again!

BELLATORUM INVICTUM!

Goals:  Alva, Franziska (2)
Assists:  Inês
MVP of the match: Franziska

One more time BISS Pudong. If there is a team that has my utmost respect is this one. They have players that knows the game and loves the game. According to my memory, we faced them six times before. We lost twice (ACAMIS 2011), we tied one (ACAMIS 2012 during the round robin) and we won four times (SISAC Semifinals 2012, ACAMIS Finals 2012 and two matches ACAMIS 2013). Once more we would face them in the semifinals of SISAC tournament.

They lost, if I am not mistaken, around 4 players (graduated) and they are going through a reformulation in their team. We also lost four players but we found great replacements, keeping the team spirit and way of playing this game. Due to the last results we had against them, I was concerned they would come with extra motivation to beat us. Well, I was not wrong but I was prepared.

Once more, our Swedish Black Spider could not be black. She had to to switch her uniform to the gray one because BISS was playing with their black uniform, even though the brackets clearly said they should play with white. Anyway, it was easier to Bella to change her uniform than BISS change the whole team’s gear.

I’ve started the match with Bella, Tehillah, Mikayla, Inês, Suh-Young on the left and Alice on the right with Franziska as striker. Alva was totally recovered but I was not so sure yet about Kyra so I decided to keep her out in the beginning to feel the match first and check how she felt. Well, did not last too long to me to have a problem. With less than two minutes in the match, Alice crashed onto a BISS Pudong player and was not feeling well so it was time to Alva to go in. By that time, BISS Pudong was “enjoying the game”. Their #16 (one of the remaining players from that match from 2011) and their #30 were exchanging passes and had already shot twice at our goal. To counter-balance, right after our Viking Alva pushed the ball forward and took a shot at their goal and the best came right after. With 6 minutes in the match, our quiet Zen Defender Mikayla, deflected a ball accidentally connecting a counter-attack with Franziska. Our German panzer, in the middle of two BISS defenders, fought for the ball and gave an awesome pass to our Portuguese Brain that just had to shoot, on the ground, away from their goalie. 1 x 0 SCIS.

Seemed that our goal shaken their team. We started dominating and not even a minute later Franziska almost had a shot at their goal. My goal was to keep the pressure so they would not have chance to attack but at the same time, asking Suh-Young on the left to stay a little back to cover the hole in the midfield that Inês would leave whenever she went up.

Our German Panzer was driving their defenders crazy. They left two on her constantly. So if Franziska was under pressure, she would quickly pass to Alva and start a play on the right, having Inês on the center helping organizing everything. For 15 minutes we only attacked, without BISS shooting any ball at our goal.  On the 16th minute our Unbreakable Dutch dribbled in our defensive system, brought it up to the midfield, passed to Franziska, that once more dribbled two but passed too strong for Alva that was sprinting to the middle. But if our Viking did not get this chance, on the 18th minute she simply dribbled two BISS defenders and shot but their goalie got it, unfortunately.

On the 22nd minute, a moment of fear. In a quick distraction of our defensive system, on a throw in from the left side, their #16 found the #30 alone. To our advantage she was not able to completely trap the ball and our Zen Defender came as a torpedo and shot this ball out. The problem was that their #30 kicked Mikayla’s leg and both fell on the ground and the referee gave a free kick to BISS and it was fairly close to our box. Their #16 got the shot and… out. Uff! And that was the end of the first half.

The problem of scoring a goal early in the game is that this automatically forces the other team to come chasing us, pressuring as much as possible to score a goal and if this happens, they will have the upper hand of the match while our team will feel trapped. So what I wanted was to the girls be calm, pass more the ball and enjoy the game, stressing BISS with a passing game. I started the second half with Bella, Mikayla and Tehillah defending, Inês center midfield, Kyra on the left, Alice on the right and Hailey as the striker. With two minutes Hailey almost score a “knee shot” on a well rehearsed corner kick taken from Inês, passing to Kyra who passed back to Inês. We are practicing this a lot, I have to say.

We kept pressuring in the attack. Kyra took a long distance shot and Hailey was pressuring non-stop there. BISS had the first shot, from far away and Bella got it with no major problem. Then ANOTHER free kick, very close to our goal box from the right side. This time Hailey, on the wall, saved the day. Hailey was AWESOME this match. Her constant movement at the attack made BISS allocate at least one player always close to her. As s natural athlete, she has the stamina of running non-stop, exhausting their players.

With 5 minutes to end the match, I had Franziska to substitute Hailey as striker and from that moment on, it was just matter of let the clock run and save energy for the final. Of course Franziska was thinking differently. She wanted to score her goal. After all, until that moment she had scored a goal in every match. The problem of SISAC and ACAMIS tournaments is the fact you have many short matches in one day so it’s a dilemma if you rest a player or let her play full matches. I decide to rest and rotate as much as possible the players. Anyway, we managed to beat our former arch-nemesis. It seems that now we are totally able to face BISS Pudong without fearing them. Now it’s about resting and prepare ourselves to our fourth SISAC tournament final in a row! As a matter of a fact this group of girls had gone to every final possible from every tournament that we were involved in the last four years. I have nothing but respect for my Amazon Warriors!

Goals:  Inês
Assists: Franziska
MVP of the match: Hailey

BELLATORUM INVICTUM!

Horrible day. Rainy, gray, boring. The perfect day for our Glass Head to play football, according to her. The SISAC tournament this year will be hosted at SAS Puxi and a new thing (the first time in my four years coaching) boys and girls will play at the same school, which is cool so we can cheer for both teams.

Our first game of the day was scheduled to 10AM but since the boys had to play at 9AM, we had to be at school at 7:35AM so we could catch the bus. For me it was really good because I wanted to watch Dulwich play. It was the first time they were part of the SISAC tournament. Last year their were invited to ACAMIS at BISS Pudong because one of the original schools dropped out. I was also worried about the rain and how the field (real grass) would react to it. If you remember correctly, we had our match against SAS Puxi cancelled because of the rain, with the argument that there were too many puddles on it. I was extremely pleased with the quality of the field. It was supporting really well the rain and at least in the fields we played there was no puddle at all.

We were the first team that arrived at SAS. While most of my team went to watch the boys match, I went with some players to watch Dulwich playing against French School. It was interesting to see them facing a school with such a strong and physical game like the French School. I could notice that Dulwich could pass but nothing better than what we did. They seemed a bit faster though. Still, the French school was pressuring them constantly and Dulwich scored on a free kick.

Anyway, let’s talk about our match. We would play the 4th place of the East league, SMIC. First problem was the fact they played with the black uniform so our Swedish Black Spider had to change her uniform to the ugly gray one. Our starting lineup for this match: Bella, Mikayla, Tehillah, Inês, Alice, Kyra and Franziska.

I was stressed because if you lose the first match, all the chances from being champions are gone. Also, as crazy as I am, I really wanted us to complete two years without losing an official match. Last time was April 14th 2012. Besides that, there is always the pressure of the opening match. Well, if there was a pressure, Franziska solved it in the first minute. Under an annoying rain, after the kick-off we had a corner kick. Kyra took the corner, Franziska slightly changed the trajectory of the ball and goal! 1 x 0 SCIS .

Having 1 x 0 in the scoreboard gave all the calmness we need for this match. SMIC had one good player, their #9 who knew how to pass and had a good idea of the game. Wonder Alice was there taking care of her. We had right after another good corner kick that Kyra took and it was a good alternation between her and Inês.

We kept pressuring. Franziska fought for a ball on the right side of the field and made a nice cross to Kyra but she fumbled and actually even fell trying to shoot the ball (things that only happens to Kyra). Besides that, there was not much worthy of comment during first half. A couple of times SMIC had a counter-attack, arriving at our defensive system 2 or 3 against 2 but they were never able to shoot, thanks to the wall Mikayla+Tehillah.

The second half on the other hand, was full of scary moments. With 3 minutes, a SMIC defensive player shot a ball on Alva’s face (“thanks” Elliot for being in front of the camera so we cannot see) and her nose started to bleed. Then I did the most ridiculous thing; normally I alternate Alice and Alva on the same position. This time I had both on the field but wanting to find a replacement to Alva, I started shouting “Alice! Alice! Alice!” and getting angry because I could not find her on the bench. Of course not, she was already in the field! Kyra came to the rescue. I was happy to know later that was not any major problem with Alva.

At the 9th minute we missed an incredible chance. Wonder Alice from the right gives an amazing pass to Franziska. With only the goalie in front of her, she does not get a nice shot so the goalie deflects, on the rebound Inês but their goalie jumped like a cat on her feet. Then Franziska had another incredible chance 3 minutes later. She was all by herself, pushing forward with two defenders chasing her but she shot on the goalie.

With 18 minutes in the second half, the other spooky moment. Right after I asked Kyra if she was ok, she traps a ball and shoots outside and starts crying saying she can’t breath. This is something new, that never happened to our Headband Girl. She is simply gasping for air and cannot speak and cannot stop crying. Phoebe goes in and I ask Kyra to lay down on the grass and relax, calm down, to think about those beautiful equations from Math HL. That seemed to do the trick and she started to calm down.

With two minutes to end the match, another corner taken by Inês from the right, this time, Phoebe very smart gets a bad deflecting from SMIC defenders and pushed the ball into the goal. I am amazed how Phoebe gets into the game and always performs well! Against German school was a wonderful pass, now a goal. Wow, girl! 2 x 0 SCIS.  After that, I’ve substituted Inês, so she could rest and also because I wanted Franziska to work as center midfield. I am scared if (knock on wood) something happens to our Portuguese Brain, we don’t have another player for that spot.

I am happy because we kept the tradition of never losing the first match at a SISAC tournament. Now another tradition to be maintained; we always go to the finals of SISAC. The problem is, to achieve that, we need to beat our arch nemesis BISS Pudong. They won against YCIS Puxi 3 x 1 and will be our adversaries at the semifinals.

Goals:  Franziska, Phoebe
Assists:
MVP of the match: This match all the girls were on the same level but for her wonderful pass to Franziska and her combative spirit, our not-so-little Wonder Alice.