Danielito

Denmark Veteran Daniel Martinez pictured above.

Daniel Martinez' smile came in through the window first, so that he seemed to follow it in through the door. But that is Daniel these days. He just finished his first semester at the community college. You look at Daniel and you feel like you are looking through your first pair of prescription sunglasses, he in sharper focus than anything you have seen before. He got a raise and is working night shift now, which excludes him from our league games. He gets his soccer on the weekend, coaching latino kids in Rock Hill, about 25 minutes South of Charlotte. Daniel will attend a coaching clinic to begin to get his coaching liscence this spring at the same time that coach Rob will go to get a more advanced liscence. Our hope is that one day Daniel could even coach the US street soccer team at a Homeless World Cup. In the meantime it will be a good way for him to earn extra money.

The Street Soccer Stars finished their regular season tonight in one of the top four spots, meaning they achieved their goal of making the play-offs. With this finish, they have finished higher than any other Street Soccer team in any competition. In contrast to the victory last week, the Stars did not make the other team unravel. Our Colombian opponents maintained their focus. It was the Stars who slipped out of their passing game and into a bit of long ball. A needless foul at the top of the box by Mike McGregor let to a quick start goal. A poorly set wall led to another. A third goal near the end was a result of not getting back goal-sides, something the team has improved on tremendously this winter. Those slip-ups made the difference in the game. We had our chances, but couldn't quite get a finish. We settled for complicated passes when the simple would have sufficed. The greatest thing of all is that we can point to a handful of slip ups and pinpoint our weaknesses. In all the years of working with street soccer teams, we have never had so few problems to address. As coaches in the past we rarely ever got past the basic fundamentals. While bad habits change slowly, we must give credit to the team despite its 5-3 loss. Another positive is that our solid opponents have taught us what we need to work on ahead of the playoffs.

We might add that few of the other team's players got up at 4am and walked to the bus stop in 20 degree weather like our goalie Tim. Most people weren't hunting down immigration papers and stressing about the status of their greencard like Dwayne. The McGregors, God bless them, are staring eviction in the face since it was their mother's name on the lease and now she failed to return from Panama. Dave was almost frantic talking with Rob yesterday on the way to pracitce, "I don't want to be homeless again, I got to get a job, I got to get education."

Stay tuned for more. Tomorrow night the 945 squad is in action. Next week is a rest before the playoffs the following week.

Composure

["Good thinking, coach!" The team has showed great progress on the field this season. Coach Rob pictured above.]

The Street Soccer Stars beat an all Jamaican team by the score of 8-4 last night. After going down we drew level within three minutes, then extended our lead at half-time to 4-3. We missed two easy chances that would have put us comfortably ahead and gave up two goals at the end that we didn't need to. We had played a great first half, finding our target men in the middle and switching the field two even three times to find an opening each possession. We said composure would make the difference in the second half. If we could play our game and not get frantic, we would win. Our composure was tested early. We dropped two goals and the lead, but again we leveled quickly. When we answered again to pull ahead 6-4, it was our opponents who lost their cool. As they fought themselves we added another goal and yet another and maintained possession of the ball most of the half. We could have easily added more to the lead as we missed two open goals and hit the post in the final minutes. We were proud of our maturity on the field today.

Dave and Michael known for their flashes of brilliance gave solid, consistent performances. Off the field their saga continues. Over-stressed to the point of a breakdown, their mother returned to Panama before Christmas after hearing of the death of relative. Not only did the price of the ticket use up her share of the rent, but they received notice the day before Christmas that she would not be returning. Just a couple weeks earlier they seemed more stable than ever. Now, their mother is gone and Dave and Michael are looking for more work to make ends meet. Street Soccer remains the most consistent thing in their life and I marvel not only at their dedication, but their improvement on the field. Here we see the benefit of dividing into two teams paying dividends for the more skilled players and the lesser skilled players, each getting the chance to develop at their own level.

We missed big D-bone and Craig who were both at practice during the day but missed the game, D-bone do to transportation issues and Craig because he was working. Practice featured three new recruits potentially debuting next week for the 945 squad. D-bone also had his long awaited immigration attorney appointment today. Fighting an addiction is a difficult thing and leads to criminalization that makes getting work and renewing your green card difficult. All admiration goes out to D who was straightforward and brave as the attorney explained the worst case scenarios to him. We will hope for the best case. D, by the way is a Jamaican national who came to the US at 13. He is now 31. Many thanks to the Anne Crowdy, sole attorney at the International House which takes on cases pro bono for the homeless.

A lot of credit goes to Jorge and Tim, our sweeper and goalie who had to be strong all day against the long ball game of our opponents.

In this our penultimate game of the regular season, we have put our selves in a good position to finish in the top 3. Mathematically we have a chance at first. Currently we sit third. We have beaten one of the two teams ahead of us and if it were not for our own mistakes against a team we should have beaten early in the competition we would be sitting in a tie for first.

If you are in town come cheer us on in our final regular season game next tuesday.

Coming Soon!

Check back soon for updates on the United States Homeless World Cup team as they prepare for the 2008 HWC in Melbourne, Australia.