Youth Soccer
in Santa Cruz County
Since we arrived in Santa Cruz,
soccer has been one of our favorite pastimes. It's what
children here play the most during grade school, with baseball and
basketball running a close second. We have no objection: Ian's father played
football (as they call soccer in England) for Slough Grammar School, his school west of London, in 1940-3, and
Ian has played in an informal way most of his life.
These first two pictures are of Charlie. In the first one, he was then the latest recruit
to the sport, emulating Alban, our first soccer star.
The photo was taken in front of the garage at home during the summer of
2000 before he actually played for a team. He was still just four years
old, and look at the glee written all over his little face!
(Sorry about the backdrop: small renovation in progress!)
For the second, below, we move on to the fall of 2005, and here he is playing for
the local Under 10 Select boys team, the Breakers, and this is serious stuff.
You can tell from the intense concentration, so well caught on film by Tony Pagliaro, a local professional photographer (http://www.tonypagliaro.com/about.html)
who we were lucky enough to have as one of the other team dads.
But
look at Charlie's style, and look again at the back yard photo over five years before!
It's the same! At least twelve seasons of youth soccer separate the two pictures (we have a
hard time keeping track), but the same style and a maturing but still comparable
enjoyment characterize both.
What do these two pictures have in common, apart from Charlie? Or should I say who do they have in
common? Paul Gooch is who. He was kicking the
ball to Charlie just outside the top photo in front of our garage, and he later became his coach,
first in the fall 2003
Santa Cruz Under 9s developmental league, and then in the
Santa Cruz County
Breakers Under 10s. In the picture on the right, he is on the sidelines during
the fall 2005 Breakers' season watching over his young charges. Way to go, Paul!
In fact, all of us
in the family would like to thank all of those who put so much effort into organizing and managing
recreational and competitive soccer in Santa Cruz County, and especially Woody, Tricia,
Rich, Marilyn, Nanette, Tom & Mary, Bob, Bryan, Hal, Drew, Nigel, Vicky
& Nate, Frank, Melissa, Tony, Paul, Chuck and Boo, Sunil! The list goes on.
Alban was our first soccer fanatic and star.
Again, we have two photos here of him, again a few years apart.
On the left, here he is in Luxemburg Gardens in Paris when he had just turned
5. Again, soccer was not a late-developing whim for this young man.
On the right, here he is red-faced after sixty minutes of hard running during
his second US season in May 1998. He always kept running and running. It took a
while for him to learn English, but he had won over his classmates, several of
whom were his teammates, with the effort he put into his soccer.
Alban's coach during his first seasons at Happy Valley School was Santa Cruz Woody,
seen at the bottom of this page in later years when he was coaching Alex. Woody had a
lot to do with Alban integrating so well into the kids' community here.
Here is another picture of Woody.
Alex picked up soccer too, as soon as
he could, and by the end of 2005 had completed six seasons himself! He loves the
game as much as his brothers (see here).
On the left, here he is in action during the spring 2004 Excel season, the
co-ed recreational youth league in Santa Cruz County. Again, we were lucky
enough to have an enthusiastic photographer among the parents, and Katie Freeman
(http://www.imageartists.com) took
this photo. Thanks Katie!!
He moved on to the Under 9s developmental league in the fall of 2005, and his
team photo is below and on the right. They were called the White Sharks,
and coached by Tony Sloss. Thanks Tony!
Tom too has been applying himself to his soccer. He started out late relative
to the other boys because of his earlier involvement in rugby while still in
France and his initial explorations of American Football when he first arrived
in the US (see this part of the family history).
But he applied himself, and found a sympathetic coach who believed in him:
thank you Sunil Bhojwani!
And in the winter 2005-6 season, he made the Harbor High School Junior
Varisty team. Here is his picture for that team. What you can't see from the
photo is that he has grown up and out in the last two years, and is now
seriously big.
As time goes on, we move into different roles as well as different teams.
Alban took a referee training course, and refereed the younger children's
teams for a while, including Alex's a couple of time.
