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RHIAN'S SOCCER JOURNALS:

SCOTTISH BLUES 10th March 2008

As most people will know by now, we lost our game against Scotland this afternoon by 2-0.

Obviously any loss is hard to take, not to mention, frustrating and demoralizing, but this one was a little different. We are here to prepare for our Olympic qualifiers in April and that is exactly what we were doing today. What I mean by that is that Even gave people a chance to prove to him what they can do out on the field. He tried people in new positions and tried a new formation.

Losing is the worst, but when a loss comes in a friendly, and after we have switched things up a little, I find it easier to handle. Our starting line up was Karina in nets, Kiss, Lexi Marton, Martina and Brit in the back, Amy Vermeulen, Kaylin Kyle, Amy Walsh and Mel Booth in the mid, and Julie and Tancredi up front. I thought we actually played well for most of the game, and in fact, we dominated large portions of the game. However, as all lovers of the game know, soccer can be fickle. One great counter attacking move by the Scots gave them the lead against the run of play, and then they scored one more on us when we started to push players forward. All credit to the Scots though. They played very well and fought for every opportunity and chance they got, and they were without their best player.

Robyn, Chappy, Jodi, Sophie and Kara all made appearances in the game, but to no avail. I can tell you that the mood on the team was pretty downcast, as you can imagine, but I don't think it will take long for people to pick themselves up and refocus on the finals coming up in two days. We will be playing the United States Under 20 team. They beat the Dutch today by 2-0

After the Scotland match, we went out for supper. After a while hotel food starts to get to you, and then you just HAVE to get out and have something different to eat. The team was depressed and down at the start of the evening, but they soon snapped out of this and started to enjoy the meal. Instead of all eating at one place, our manager Les gave us each some money so that we could go where we wanted. This is often the best way to go, especially for the vegans and the steak lovers, who rarely see eye to eye on the best places to dine.

Then. after eating we all wandered back to the bus, a few of us along the beach. It was on the beach that I found a kids' ride shaped like a donkey. You probably know the ones, those where you put in a quarter, and then it rocks back and forth. We had fun with this for a bit, which will tell you what simple pleasures we live for. We were all a little early getting back to the rendezvous, so we had a ton of time to take pictures galore. Some of these are very creative! The evening turned out well, and morale is back up, after a tough day, mentally and physically.