Hannah
Thanks to my main man DJ (his daughter is the goalie), the u14 soccer girls have a 360-degree camera that films their matches so we can all go back and watch the tape in the hopes of getting better.
It also has a mic.
While I guess the purpose of that mic is to pick up the players talking, because DJ sets it up on the sideline opposite the benches, it mostly just picks up the parents. And you can tell a lot about a match (and the vibes) from what the parents have to say. (I am so grateful for the hot mic, but also grateful that it is not set up anywhere near me.)
Anyhow, without outing anyone, I think we had my favorite hot mic moment at a recent tournament…
My daughter takes the corner kicks for our team, so I always go back and watch those. I was rewatching one where we had scored because I couldn’t quite tell who had ended up getting a foot on it. It turned out to have been an own goal.
What was funny, though, is that the parents and players had clearly had a clearer view than I had because none of them really celebrated the goal. On the tape, I saw my daughter send the ball into the box and then an opposing player swing at it and knock it into the net.
Then silence.
Then a mother’s singular voice… “Hannah.”
Now here’s the thing. I have scored an own goal. My daughter has scored an own goal. I know what it’s like to be both Hannah and Hannah’s mom. But the thing about an own goal, at least in these circumstances, is that it was the consequence of effort. Hannah was attacking the ball. She got there first. She should be commended (which is also what I said to my daughter after her own own goal).
But when a ball is coming in fast, dipping and swerving, and you get your angle just a little bit wrong, well, that is the difference between an own goal and a clearance. While the difference in process is tiny, the difference in outcome feels pretty bad.
In the same tournament, one of our wingers scored what might end up being the goal of the season. She took a pass, streaked down the sideline, beat a defender, and banged the ball in from outside the box off the far post. At the end of the game, I told her to remember what that felt like. She shrugged.
“It was supposed to be a cross.”
The world is a humbling place. You do things right and they turn out wrong. Then you do them wrong and they turn out right. In both cases, you feel sheepish.
Hannah.
– Tim
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