Team Arsenal

Alex had a great soccer season with Arsenal.

They moved up to the U9 division, with ten players now on their team.

They play 5x5, plus a goalie, and there are THREE refs for each game.

The field, and the goal, are a LOT bigger.A lot of my pictures look like this one, hard to tell who is who (although I can tell you that's Alex on the right, with his foot on the ball).

We also learned about getting down on one knee as a sign of respect when a player is injured.

This was our first year having goalies, and its hard for everyone.

For the players who find it harder to score.

For the players who have to protect against direct penalty kicks right at the goal line (looking at this photo, it might be time to start playing with cups in the spring. Boys will be boys).

For the parents who have a hard time remembering its just a team of third graders.

But especially for the player whose turn it is to be goalie.

There's a lot of downtime when you are goalie, waiting for the action to return to you.

But when it does - the pressure is ON.

All of our Arsenal players found this a difficult position.

Still, we only lost to one team all season - although we lost to them three times. :( Arsenal hasn't lost a game in five years, so this was a bit tough for some of the boys.

But it was a good lesson to learn, and Alex played his heart out in game after game.

He took no prisoners.

He took some hits.

But he kept on playing.

We love soccer!