I had just taken a bath and I can still remember the very recent pain I felt from my bruises as I poured cold water over my body. Along with the pain were flashes of what had happened in our practice this afternoon in Marikina.

Many kids trained today. In fact, Mang Almer’s service was not enough to carry all the kids to Marikina. We had to call Mang Elmer. When I arrived at MSP with Troy and some outreach kids, I reserved the field from 3 to 6PM. The weather was great and we had all our equipment ready. There were plenty of kids at 3PM so we started training right away.

We trained at the left side of the field from 3-4PM before having practice games. Boys born 95 and 96 played the highschool girls from 4-5. There were 9 girls who attended practice. I was very happy with this number though Riana and Marsha were absent due to a party in Alabang for the Dana Cup Team. Apple and Louise were absent also due to homework and not feeling well respectively. As a result of these absences in the girls team, the elementary boys crushed them 5-1 in 40 minutes before I put in some highschool boys to help the girls.

Skie, Rvin, James, and John came from all sides causing confusion on the clearly out-of-shape girls team. They took shots left and right. The girls managed to clear some balls but defenders Troy, Edward, Vinz, and Tim kept sending the balls back to the forwards or the halfbacks (Jason and Luigi) who distributed the balls very well.

In the “Highschool vs Brookside Boys” game, HEdCen highschool scored 2 consecutive goals in the last 10 minutes to win 3-1. Again, Coach Bernard, myself, Andrew, and Bong played for the losing team. Nathan and Justin Santos played for us too. We dominated the first 20 minutes of the game and even went ahead early 1-0. I played central defender for Brookside. My defenders were Nathan and Justin. We took care of their offense very well until Pea and Shane beat our midfielders to the center causing us problems in marking. Andrew was forced to adjust to backcourt to neutralize the highschool’s midfield attack. We, the defenders, did a couple of offside traps that worked.

About 5 to 10 minutes before halftime, we encountered another problem. Renee dribbled the ball in the middle and there was no one taking him. We kept moving back because each of us defenders were marking attackers in a good position to score from a pass from Renee. When Renee reached the area just outside the penalty box, he took the shot and sent the ball over Sam hitting the top bar before going in. The game was tied 1-1 because of this. After that goal, I kept telling myself I should’ve challenged him earlier. Renee can kick very well. I should’ve known better.

The game was tied at halftime. After a 2-minute break, we resumed play. This time, Pea dominated. One of his crosses slipped past Sam’s reach and found an unmarked Kevin Benjamin in the right post. The defenders tried to get to him but the ball met Kevin’s foot and was sent straight to the net before anyone could stop him. Highschool lead 2-1 then.

I decided to exchange places with a midfielder to help our team catch up. We had a couple of good runs but Highschool defenders Nino and Zach were very tough to beat in front. Though Coach Bernard worked like a tireless horse, they never let him through.

All it took was one counterattack after I switched from defense to offense for them to score another goal. It was Pea this time who dribbled down the left side all the way to the base line. Then, he evaded his defender and continued to carry the ball towards the goal until he created a tiny angle to the goal, took the shot, and hit his mark at the far post.

My team tried desperately to equalize with 2 goals but again failed as time expired.

During that desperate time of trying to draw the game, I got bumped and fouled by some highschoolers which resulted to bruises on my knee and shoulder. I don’t normally complain about pain, but I guess I just didn’t expect to have to work or play this hard against the highschoolers. I’m happy my boys are getting better and tougher, but I’m also “sad” that we’ve been losing to these kids…hehe…I feel like I’m getting old. Nah, I can’t think that way if I want to win. We have to match their competitiveness in our next practice game. I’ll set the date some time this week.