Newberg, OR — Well that was a tough one! I thought we really came out and competed against that team! Just so everybody is aware, the team we played Saturday, is also playing at the club level with that coach. They really are an excellent team with great athletes! That being said, I know that our girls can beat them ! We also have excellent athlete and excellent skills! We were also missing two of our players on Saturday, Payton and Aubrey. Early on in the game, Bella Beaudry was kicked hard in the stomach with the soccer ball. She drop down because the wind was knocked out of her and she was clearly in pain. It was an obvious injury that the referee should've blown the whistle for. Of course our girls stopped playing, out of concern for Bella, to check on her, and the other team took full of advantage of that and scored a goal. 😢 In my mind we tied that game and that goal should never have counted. As a coach, my number one priority is our player safety. I definitely could've handled the situation better. I became emotional because of my bond with all of the girls. I will always protect all of the girls on my team and defend them when needed. I was very upset with the referee for not stopping the game so I could check on Bella. I never should've had to run out on the field yelling at him to stop the game. My apologies for losing my cool. 😬 One thing I have always told the girls is that you cannot control reffing. At this age, we are not given professional referees, we are given high school students and sometimes college students. They do the best they can, they are not paid so they don't always get every call right. I know it's frustrating to everybody but we need to remember to give them some grace, me included 😉 This is the age for Learning and developing skills. Of course everybody likes a win but at this age we're trying to focus on becoming better players and learning the game and the skills as well as being great teammates with a deep respect for others. Overall, I thought the girls played awesome! They were aggressive, they played their positions well! They stayed on the correct side of the field. There was a lot of passing with eyes up and looking where they were going while dribbling. They are also getting better at shouting out each other's names when passing the ball. This is huge for future development! They stayed wider on the field which allowed them more access to their teammates and more opportunities at scoring goals. I love that they are moving up the field together and defense is really playing an important part in our game! During this particular game, the other team monopolized our goal for about 70% of the game. The fact that they did not score many more goals than they did, is a clear testament to how well our defense and our goalie did! I think if we meet this team again on the field and we have all of our players there is no doubt my mind that we will beat them ! Please tell the girls how proud I am of their performance on the field on Saturday, I'm sorry it took me a while to get this out. It's been a busy weekend, Gracie had 2 club soccer games, one right after our rec game on Saturday down in Corvallis and another on Sunday, so we've been traveling. 😬 Thanks to Isabellas family for the snacks on Saturday and thanks for your continued support! We will have practice tomorrow night normal time 5 to 7 PM and on Thursday I believe we're going five to 6:30 PM again with Coach Taylor. Have a great night ! Coach Hess