Part 1: Tonight we play Mechelen. They are a Premier League team 45 minutes in Belgium from where we are staying. We are going to play on their grounds and being that it is 2 levels above who we played yesterday, they should be lots better. We’ll see I’ll be letting you guys know. We have a light training session this morning going over free kicks and other set pieces before tonight.
Part 2:
Day 3 continued...
We got hammered by Miechenen. It is a Premier League team in Belgium (top flight). It was a mix of startes and reserves that we played against and they were very good on the ball. In particular going forward. I never thought that I could enjoy losing so badly so much. I had a great time and in situations like this, when you are playing with a team who have only just gotten together the past few days and everyone is trying to play their own game, you will have trouble. Though the game was 6-0, it was not as lopsided as the score shows. They were just far more clinical in the final third, and we had a few players that kept making individual mistakes because I don’t think they were ready for that type of level. As for me, I thought I played some of my best soccer in the past 5 years. It is a pretty incredible experience when you play soccer uninhibitedly. Meaning, not afraid to make mistakes is when the best stuff comes out. It is when you are making more mistakes than doing positives in the game that individual mistakes cause major problems or you make them in the wrong area of the field that it will hurt. But players can’t be afraid to make mistakes especially in environments like these where you are trying to catch the eye of a few people. If you play safe, you might not get noticed. Anyway, I am very glad that I have had the experience playing in the USL-1, I defintley could tell that it was a major reason why I could hang in this game and play so well. The league that Freddy and I have been playing in is a very good league and it is at the level of these teams but the difference is that players and people treat the game differently over here. It is so much more enjoyable when soccer and its players are appreciated for playing well. And players go to work in an environment where they are treated and therefore feel professional. While the talent pool in the US can compete and the individual can be very good, the organizations and fans have plenty to learn about how to treat the game and its players.
Anyway, despite the loss, I say it was a success. I’ll talk to you all soon. -Kiki
