indoor mania

2 futsal teams and 1 indoor turf team is how TopGun is staying in shape this winter. No outdoor practice until mid February. If you need to see us in action or are thinking of trying out, contact us at sasc.tg97@gmail.com

TopGun take 2nb at their home Medina Tournament

Following the thrills of Vegas, TopGun took it easy with a local tournament, playing at U14 for the Medina Classic at Jollyman Park in Cupertino... well, the girls took it easy, but the Site Directors and Marshals spent a lot of time on the field making the tournament work for SASC.

Game 1 was against Manteca Pumas. We have a great relationship with this team and this was the first time we would play them competitively. The Pumas play NorCal Premier and battered us 4-1 in a scrimmage last year. But both teams have changed a lot. Pumas played as we remembered, getting the ball wide and banging dangerous crosses into the box. However, the game was very even and with some better luck on offside calls, Ysa and Angelina would have had at least two 1v1s on the Manteca GK... he kept giving offside for what were perfectly valid plays. Manteca sneaked a lead on a defensive mix up where a back pass to Carrie would have been a simple solution. Through the rest of the game, the 50:50 nature was maintained and the Hannah missed a glorious chance to equalise, the ball rolling a few inches in front of goal, but somehow whe failed to kick it in and the ball rolled wide. Also nice to see JJ back in action about 4 months earlier than we thought.

Game 2 on saturday afternoon we mixed things up a bit and paid the price going down 4-0 to a good Castro Valley team who had 3 giants playing for them. I checked their driving licenses and they were legit to play.

So, come Sunday, we think we are out of it. Next game is against Ajax U14 from Modesto. They tied the Pumas and beat Storm easily on Saturday.... but on Sunday they faced a re-awakened TopGun. Angelina and Ysa were finding loads of space going forward and our defence and mids were owning the Pink shirts of Ajax. TopGun took the lead with a strong shot from Yoshi which escaped the grip of the GK and crept over the line. Ajax equalised with a break through the middle and a good shot into the corner evading Carrie's dive. TG got back in front with a great free-kick from Tess which went direct into the far left corner of the Ajax net. A note on size.. if the U14 girls are a fair representation of girls at this age, then the TG players will be much bigger next year - there were some rather scary encounters for our smallest players (Angelina and Allanah) against players bigger than the TG coaches (who are not known for their tallness). In the second half Cali and Olivia added goals to complete a 4-1 victory which meant 11 points in the unusual system employed for this tournament..... hmmm, maybe we could sneak a placement

In the meantime, Castro Valley battered the Pumas 5-1 and TG's win over Ajax handed 1st place to Castro Valley - so who could get second. Pumas and Ajax were best positioned, both being 1-1-1 compared to Storm and TG being 1-0-2. However, Pumas fell 1-0 to Storm. Castro Valley played against Ajax in what was a dead rubber for CV. But a win for Ajax would have secured second place for them. In a game that was closer than expected, Ajax took a 2-0 lead, only to be pegged back to 2-2. In the final seconds Ajax had the ball right on the goal line but it wouldn't go in which meant TG v. Storm was a winner takes all final game for 2nd place ( and last place )

Storm and TG have played 3 times recently. One win each, and last time a 0-0 tie, which is a fair reflection of the level of both teams. TG started the stronger and made numerous crosses into the Storm box. Eventually a Tess corner was flicked on by Angelina for a tap in by Ysa. Storm pulled a goal back with a set play from the second half kick off where the TG defence were still asleep. But TG got the lead back and the 2-1 win when Ysa got on the end of through ball from Yoshi to prod past the Storm GK..... wow TG snuck into second place, the table is linked below


http://www.gotsport.com/rankings/event.aspx?EventID=11336&GroupID=141658

Vegas Mayors Cup Champions

Oct 22-24, 2010. The TopGun97-Red girls headed to Las Vegas to play in their first "out of state" tournament. This Mayor's Cup is a platinum ranked tournament and is rapidly becoming one of the most respected tournaments in the USA. And the reputation is deserved. The organisation was superb, and the grass fields were cut to perfection with not a bump or gopher hole in sight.

There were 12 teams in TG's section, split into 4 groups of 3 with the group winners advancing to the semi finals - so no room for error, 2 games would decide whether the girls played a semi final and possible final, or just a consolation game on sunday

The games for TopGun started at 8am on saturday morning with a 3-0 victory over Arizona Fury. Maximum points was a good start but next up was Rubisport from Tijuana, Mexico. They played against Fury in between the TG games and scored a 3-1 victory so we went into the game knowing that a tie was good enough to progress. The game was like a classic Europe v. Mexico encounter. The Mexicans played lots of short passes trying to keep possession, TopGun played fewer and longer passes and were more direct. The game finished 7-2 in TopGun's favor and so the girls headed to a semi final on sunday morning (after quite a lot of fun on saturday night)

The semi final was a very tough game against FC Alliance Gold from Seattle who are ranked #10 in Washington and are a very good team full of skill and aggression. TopGun took the lead twice in this game, only for Alliance to equalise from corners within minutes of each TG goal. Alliance applied lots of pressure in the final 10 minutes but TopGun held strong to take the game to PKs and prevailed 3-1. And so to the final against Surrey Guildford United from Canada. Here TopGun were the stronger team and forced multiple saves from the Canadian GK in the first 10 minutes but the ball would not go in. United were more of a threat in the second half and TG continiued to fire shots on goal as well, but the clock ran down and the game finished 0-0. So more PKs and TopGun won again, 4-2 this time to become champions. In true Vegas style, the presentation was made on a stage with speeches given via microphone while "we are the champions" played through the PA !!.

Some more points !

Last week TG did a 1st ever and lost 2 games on the trot... we stopped that run this weekend

Topgun pulled out a 2-1 win against the SCC Breakers "A" team on saturday afternoon. This was an important win against another team in the bottom half of the Silver Elite bracket and gives TopGun some breathing space.

The girls started with our now familiar 3-4-3 formation and gave the Breakers a real going over in the first half. The game really should have been done and dusted by half time as Olivia, Hannah, and Ysa missed at least 5 reasonable chances between them. The score at half time was only 1-0 after a nice finish from Ysa. This was worrying. We all now recognise the pattern when TG misses that many good chances, and Breakers are a good team.... and they soon reminded us of that in the second half as they piled a lots of pressure on our penalty box with neat interchanges in the middle of the field. Breakers equalised with another of those high loopy shots that dipped in under the cross-bar. We are conceding a lot of goals this way, but another year and this will stop happening and then other teams are going to need to play proper attacking soccer. Finally we worked out how to clog up the midfield and stop the Breakers attacks and then with the game almost over, Ysa got on the end of a long clearance and unleashed and ferocious shot from the right which hit the side netting giving the Breakers goalkeeper no chance. 2-1 to TG and closing in on 3rd place.

Cruyff

The prize for the best Cruyff turn video goes to Tess.... no-one else bothered to send one in


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1k7DGqRF5g&feature=related

SCC Breakers 3 TopGun 3

Breakers were skilful throughout and nearly all players could hit the ball very hard. They also had one girl who could launch very big throw ins, and thats where the first goal came from as the ball bounced over our back 3 for an easy shot in the middle of the goal. Breakers looked very good up until this point but the goal against spurred greater effort from TopGun and it wasn't long before we were level as Ysa crossed from the left for a tap-in by Angelina. Chances were being created at both ends in a very open and mostly fair game. Both sets of parents were getting upset at the refs, so nothing new there. TG took the lead when JJ was upended by something in the penalty box. Peyton unleashed an unstoppable PK. Breakers equalised when a speculative shot from distance hung in the wind and dropped under Carries bar. Half time. The second half continued to be open with lots of good soccer from both teams ( the refs commented on this at half time and at the end of the game ). TG took a 3-2 lead when Ysa was tripped in the box and Peyton again smashed an unstoppable penalty into the net. We nearly held on for the win until some defensive confusion and a missed offside allowed a free shot to level the game at 3-3 with 5 minutes to go.... and even after this both teams had clear chances to win the game with Carrie pulling off a couple of great saves and Ysa missing by inches with a cross shot.

Great start for the team at this level

TopGun97-Red are Magic Cup Gold Champions

following a dramatic come-back from 2-0 in the final against Santa Rosa Fury, TopGun97-Red won the PK shootout to become Magic Cup Champions

Ysa crosses, Angelina scores. 2-2 and the crowd goes wild

Carrie saves the final Fury PK and TopGun wins the Magic Cup

Tournament of Champions

A tournament full of turf at Redwood City. Actually I liked Red Morton park despite the weirdness of 3 turf fields surrounded by small patches of real grass.

TopGun started very slowly against Castro Valley. A bunch of missed chances meant it was 0-0 at half time despite complete dominance. So we switched things a lot in the second half with Jes and Angelina pushed into attacking roles. This slowed the pace of the TG attacks and created more crosses which I think works well on turf as the sprint team were struggling to stop the ball running out for goal kicks in the first half. Jes broke the deadlock, winning a sprint race to a diagonal ball from JJ and toe-poking into the net past the onrushing GK. Tess scored a sweet 25 yard side foot goal high into the net for the second and Angelina finished with aplomb following a devastating run and pass from Jes. There were 3 players open for the pass for that one. Then it seemed that TG settled on turf and played some very nice attacking football.... but....

..... come game 2 and our turf problems are back. 0-0 final score v. Juventus Thunder. TG were rushing their passes and missing them badly... but still it was total dominance and we ended with about 20 shots to 0.5 shots. A win would have secured a place in the semi final but the tie meant we needed 1 point from the final game v. Power to be sure...

... and we should have got a win against Power which would have provided an easier semi final. Power have beaten TG 2-0 in both previous meetings and were good for those wins. This time it was 2-1 but TG had more possession and more shots but couldn't get the win and let in 2 sloppy goals. However, we got our first headed goal when JJ put in a cross from Ysa. It was quite impressive and the Power coaches were quite shocked. Earlier, Angelina had hit the post and just after JJ's goal she nearly sneaked on in the near post... so we shoulda won and the closeness of the game shows how much progress the team has made.....

.... but then the semi final against a very good OV Heat team showed how far there is to go !!

Turf Practice

Games on turf fields have been a weakness for TopGun for a while : the fast running ball caused the girls to rush their plays and miss shots. We only ever saw them at tournaments and spent >90% of game time and practice time on bumpy grass. So with the summer tournaments just around the corner in Redwood City and Morgan Hill, where turf use is common, we decided to get some practice on turf. The Foothill League ( MVLA and SASC ) has a great system where fields can be reserved for $40 for 2 hours so we scheduled Graham Middle school for 3 sessions. Last week we got outplayed by the best passing team in California (Rays98) and lost 5-0. This week TG played MTH Pirates. Last time it was 2-0 (Spring2009); on saturday TG won 9-1. But the score was irrelevant, this was turf practice, and in the final 20 minutes TG finally started playing soccer on turf. What this meant was : passing and moving; controlling the ball, more patient attacks (charging to goal is difficult on turf); switching the play; passing backwards (which we do not recommend on bumpy grass fields in our own half of the field).
So all good stuff. Next week we play MXG and the focus will be passing and moving again, then its the Tournament of Champions in Redwood City, and for the 1st time TopGun is a seeded team (#2).

winners and 2nd place

TopGun split into two for the Powerade 5v5 tournament in Cupertino. They played U13 to help make up numbers in that bracket and ended up with both teams in the championship game... which went to PKs... and then it took 6 PKs to separate the teams..

So TopGun won the title and TopGun took second place

and Tess won Goalie Wars

and JJ won the juggling contest


coooooooooooooool

TopGun 2-1 Sporting White97

Great victory in a scrimmage last night at SSC. Great goal by Olivia with a 35 yard lob volley over the advanced GK. JJ got the other goal with a tap in from a Tess free kick.

Defense played awesome to keep Sporting down to 1 goal.

This weekend its 5v5 in Cupertino

TopGun reach D2 Cup Gold Final

we lost on PKs in the final, but this is the most senior tournament the team has played and the girls are undefeated for the weekend. Three victories in group play, then a 1-1 tie in the final. All group games were against teams from the higher Red Spring bracket.... just think, maybe we could even have won that division..... next we wait for placement in the CCSL Fall League


bye bye to Spring Soccer, TG did about 8.7X better than we hoped for

weekend of championship celebrating

Sharks and Utd tied 1-1 on friday evening which meant TopGun could not be caught and thus became winner of the U12G white bracket.

On saturday TG lost their first ever league game, 2-0 to a talented and powerful Pacifica team. The game was tight, but Pacifica put their chances in the net and TG didn't

On Sunday TG beat Peninsula Revolution 1-0 in Foster City. Nice goal from Tess and great defence in the 1st half playing against a howling wind. The win put TopGun 4 points clear at the top of the table


Table at the bottom http://www.gotsport.com/rankings/event.aspx?EventID=9018&GroupID=116481


BTW... there are ranking points for winning these league

From the EPL

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxJ9wdXXbwY

4-2 win versus United

its always tough to play against sister teams. There is intensity but one can end up feeling guilty about that intensity. From a coaches perspective it was a clash of Wales v. Scotland, two well recognised world powers in soccer.

TG won the game 4-2 and were never behind

5-0 win v. Burlingame

I watched this game via txt msgs from Allanah, Tracey and Sally. They had me worried for the 1st half with tales of 1-0 up but lots of chances at our end, but then it was 3-0 before I knew it just after half time. Txts were arriving faster than I could read them. Carrie came out of goal and scored the 5th to add to two each from Ysa and Olivia, everyone else tried different positions. Awesome result against a Fall 1A team !

Next week...... United !!

Nil...

0-0 v MVLA

TG decided to have an off day, which combined with the crowded Cobras defence meant we didn't get many shots on goal either. We got more than them, and the final 10 minutes was frantic with TG pounding the Cobras penalty box with crosses and corners, but the ball wouldn't run for us and we couldn't get the final touch to get the ball into the net.


6-0 win v. Alpine Raptors

TG were super intense on sunday afternoon in Portola Valley. It was a gorgeous afternoon and a beautiful setting for the game. TG dominated from the kick off but struggled to find their free flowing fast soccer due to the small size of the field. However, after 15 minutes or so, the small field contributed to our first goal. Tess was back to her normal self after a sluggish game on saturday and was constantly stealing the ball from the Raptors midfield. On this occassion she made the steal, poked the ball between 2 Raptors players then hit one of those Tess big guns over the keeper and into the corner of the net. Roger was seen handing out high 5s to anyone who would accept. Olivia scored the second, following up her own vertical punt which the Raptors defence struggled to deal with, leading to a tap in for O. Ysa dribbled through 27 players for the 3rd and then it was half time. Carrie came out of goal for the second half and played forward. Olivia went in goal. Carrie proceeded to terrorise the left defence zone for the Raptors, sprinting passed their left D on many occassions and sending in huge right foot bombs either as shots or crosses. Eventually Hannah got a tap in for 4-0, Ysa added another for 5-0, and Celine smashed one into the roof of the net from 5 inches out for 6-0. Everyone played much better than on saturday. Carly is getting more confident and stronger with every game, Paola is settling nicely into the team, Amani, Addie and Yoshi are getting back to more consistent play

Four games to go and we've exceed the .500 status we were aiming for.

Coooooooooooool

2 man bicycle kick

http://sports.yahoo.com/soccer/blog/sow_experts/post/The-two-man-bicycle-kick?urn=sow,236168

MXG 0 TopGun 3

players were absent, MXG brought along size 5 balls, the halves were 5 minutes too long.... does TopGun care - not at all.

The TG line up had a fresh feel as Cali, Lulu, and Celine were absent. We also weren't sure until late on whether Carly's ankle would be ready for a tough game and whether Olivia would get back from Disneyland. So we had Monica and JJ from the Sharks as guest players for the day. This meant that Carrie got to play outfield for the 1st half with Monica in goal.

Nerves were calmed very early in the game when Ysa sneaked a goal in from an impossible angle. I like it when we score very early in a game. Following this, it was a fairly typical TG v MXG game with plenty of midfield battling and few chance in the TG goal. Also in typical manner, TG missed some 1v1s, with Ysa shaving the cross bar with a shot during the extra 5 minutes of game time in the 1st half.

Carrie went in goal for the second half, Monica played at stopper. TG were far more dominant in the second half, regardless of which players were on the field. We forced a series of corners and hit some wonderful crosses into the MXG box but couldn't find a second goal until Tess hit one of those shots we've all been predicting for a long time. She turned from the leftmost corner of the MXG box and hit a high shot which the MXG keeper could only help into the net. Calls of "good goal" came from the MXG coaches. TG were then put under some pressure for 5 minutes and Carrie had to make some brave stops at the feet of MXG strikers, but following 2 corners against us, TG broke up the field with great speed and accuracy, finished off with a left foot tap in for Olivia and a 3-0 victory.

TG were efficient without being spectacular in this game. Hannah and Yovanna blocked almost everything at the stopper position, Tess and Yoshi fought hard in the middle, Alexia, Paola and JJ covered defence and offence well at outside mid, Amani and Carly finally worked out the right defence position by the end of the game.

Thankyou to JJ and Monica, and Kudos to Sierra who showed up to say goodbye and cheer us on. She is moving to West Valley OA and we wish her all the best

TopGun 2 San Carlos Tsunami 0

another win in class 1B, still no goal against TopGun, and the girls didn't even play very well today. Actually... Lulu, Alexia and Carrie played very well, Addie came back to almost full form. The other girls were kinda sluggish.

Our hopes for a 500 season are getting closer to being realised.

TopGun bossed most of the game but Tsunami were in it and were dangerous with big kicks aimed at Jes. Tsunami have some good skills, but threatened our goal the most with a more direct approach, assisted by planting their forwards right on top of our sweeper. Fortunately, any breaks were cleared up by Yovanna, Amani, and Carrie.

We missed our usual 5 clear chances before finally putting one in the net. Well played to all the mids and forwards who positioned themselves perfectly as Ysa attacked down the left - the final result being a tap-in at the back post for Alexia who was exactly where she was supposed to be. The midfield battle was kind of even, mostly because TG were not picking their marks very well. We fixed this in the second half by shuffling the deck a little. Yoshi went right mid and played much better, Tess and Lulu controlled the center.

In the second half, Tsunami forced a succession of corner kicks, all ably snuffed out by Carrie who simply caught the high balls being hit into the box. The final 15 minutes saw TG dominance and a whole bunch of wasted chances to score until a solid cross from the right was deflected off a Tsunami defender for an own goal. Alexia then put a great chance just wide. 3-0 would have been a fair scoreline, but we'll take 2-0 against a team who tied us 1-1 in the D2 cup last Fall.

3-0-0, next up MXG, and we have quite a few players missing

D2 Spring... the start of class 1 proper

take a look at the other results in the red and white brackets
http://www.gotsport.com/events/results.aspx?EventID=9018&Sex=Girls&Age=12

.... and you will see TG deserves to be playing at this level. Juventus Lightning and Peninsula Power recorded big wins in the red bracket, so I wonder how TG would fare against the beaten teams

In the White bracket opener, the girls played a great battling game against a talented MVU team yesterday and ran out with a 1-0 win. Carrie played an awesome game in goal, aggressively taking any ball within reach and clawing down some high shots that came from outside the box. However, on balance, TG should have won by more goals. Our attacks penetrated the MVU box more and we had more one on one chances than MVU. This week I will be showing Ysa how to hit a right foot toe shot when attacking down the left side. Player of the game was Tess who worked tirelessly in center midfield and won every 50:50 ball against some big and powerful MVU players. Olivia put in our goal following a typical sprint burst down the left, cutting back for a right foot shot that went in off the keeper.

Congratulations TopGun97G, a great start !!

2 class 1 tournaments

and we managed 1 win and 1 tie out of 6 games. Its a better record than some established class 1 teams and we were missing players so I'm optimistic for a 500 season.

The games of note over the last 2 weeks :

1) backs to the wall tie against Juventus Lightning who are now a class 1A team. The wind was blowing straight down the field so it was a classic game of two halves with each team managing a solitary goal playing with the wind. Carrie pulled of loads of saves, but our defenders have to learn to get out of the way of the GK and to make sure they have the ball before kicking it. In the final 30 seconds, both teams had good chances to win the game... it was fun !!

2) 2-1 defeat to MVLA Barracudas. The goals against were soft and the 1st one should not have counted as the half time whistle was due 5 minutes before the ref called it... which he did after I reminded him it was half time. The first half was even, but we bossed the second half and had great chances to score another couple of goals. The passing was great in this game. TG moved the ball wide, and if the attack needed to slow down, they girls did this and recycled the ball. They will have to do this more and more to retain possession against class 1 teams.

Some more on the Jamboree weekend. The event was awesome, as agreed by all participating teams and Jade ran the snack shack with aplomb !! Great weekend for Alexia who played aggressively, defended and attacked well, and set up the goal of the tournament for Olivia. Amani came back to some decent form, and coach Jon spotted 3 things that killed us all weekend, that the girls will fix for the Spring season. 1) Stop being afraid of the ball and perform the delay drill when defending, 2) own the ball before kicking it, 3) trust team-mates, don't ball watch, stay in position and mark your player.

continued OTW dominance

11-1 v. MTH this time. Not sure where everyone was though, TG had no subs for this game, but that meant the 7 players got a good workout... actually, Hannah and Allanah had just played for Sporting in a regular game so they maybe didn't need the extra workout.

The goals came from everywhere, including some intricate passing and use of the back wall.

Next week is Stanford Class 1 tournament on turf. Any ties or wins will be a success for TG

Always look on the bright side of life

Some videos showing that the missed chances by the TopGun players pale into insignificance compared to the professional players

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7k4l04_JkA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VemrcpEDHwY&feature=related

at least the 2nd place trophy is really nice

somehow, we didn't beat Firestorm in the final of the Stanford Spring Cup. Firestorm won on PKs after a very tense 1-1 tie. For perspective, Firestorm got the ball into the TG penalty box twice... no more, just twice. The first time led to a goal. Even that excursion was by chance - Carrie cleared the ball but it rebounded off Yoshi back towards the TG goal and released a Firestorm player who hit a weak shot that was wide of Sierra but into the back of the net. By this point, TG had hit the cross bar from 2 yards out, Olivia missed by inches with a great header from Tess' corner and we wasted countless other chances to score.... its actually getting a bit worrying, as this is a theme dating back to the Eureka game in Association Cup.

Even in group play at Stanford, TG made things tougher than necessary. Juventus had two shots and scored 2 goals, TG had 20 shots and scored 3 goals. The group game against Firestorm should have been a 6-0 win instead of a 2-0 win. We will work on "finishing" at practice.

And I have to say, the trophy is pretty cool !

Cute Goal

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeTVU0xHohU&feature=topvideos

indoor dominance

Sporting held us 2-2 at half time, but then the underage girls arrived from the Sporting green game and it ended up 7-2.

The second game was odd. MTH have some good footwork, but kept getting tied up in knots. I think at one point the score was 2-1, but then at half time it was 5-1. I have no idea who scored most of the goals, it was a blitz. Lulu (Tess) got 2 in the second half, and Yovanna smashed a rocket against the cross bar. It finished 11-2.

Next week is the Stanford class 3 tournament with no indoor games. Looking forward to this !!

the league table for indoor is linked off the TG homepage

Beautiful weather, saturday feb 13th

so what does TG do ? Starts the indoor season of course.

http://otw-santa-clara.ezleagues.ezfacility.com/leagues.aspx

not everyone is up for playing indoor, so we have 9 players + Allanah, with Yovanna and KK joining us next week.

First opposition was Sporting 98 white who are very different from last Fall and are a tough bunch. However, TGs firepower was way too much for a class 3 team one year younger. Tess fired in two rockets before 2 minutes was up. Alannah and Hannah followed quickly with another two, then Hannah made it 5-0 before half time with another huge shot. For those new to indoor soccer, one the goal differential in 5 or more, the team leading can only send 2 players at a time beyond the attack side yellow line. Coach Ron seemed to have forgotten this rule.

Sporting got stuck into TG in the 2nd half and scored 2 goals, much to the delight of their fans. It was fun listening to the parents shouting from the seating area - the game was played in a great spirit. Then TG took control again and fired in 4 goals. Allanah completed a Hat-trick with 2 goals and Ysa and Addie scored the others for a 9-2 result.

Despite the scoreline, this was a great workout for the girls and is really helping their passing and quick thinking. They need to work on getting open with check-moves and to make some more accurate passes.... challenges for the coming weeks at OTW

The Return of the TG

its been a frustrating few weeks of rain with only a couple of practices possible.

So when Stanford Firestorm offered a scrimmage on the turf at Mayfield we accepted in nanoseconds.

There's been so much rain that there were even pools on this new turf field and it made for some interesting moments when the ball got stuck in them.

TG has not played a scrimmage for a while. Its been pretty intense soccer all Fall and Winter and we took max opportunity to get everyone in the game.

Firestorm are a decent team with some good skills but from the opening exchanges, it did look like they would struggle with the power and pace of TG. Olivia and Ysa switched from their usual roles with Olivia on the last defender and Ysa dropping deep to receive the ball. This worked very well and Ysa played Olivia through on goal twice in the opening 10 minutes, but the very good Firestorm keeper kept the score at 0-0. Alexia and Celine took on the wide midfield roles for the first half and played at their best, supporting the offence and defence as needed. Carrie and Yovanna owned the defensive middle and snuffed out any threats from the girls in red. TG took a 1-0 lead when Ysa received a ball in the Firestorm box and fired her shot high into the net. For the end of the 1st half Jeska and Cali played at forward with Ysa and Olivia taking a break. This made for a very different passage of soccer. Jes and Cali passed the ball between each other more than our usual sprint team and were also a lot more physical, causing Firestorm to lose the ball in defence more often. Also, the slower pace of the attacks at this stage brought our midfield players into attacking positions.

At the start of the second half TG went out with one of our fave line ups 3-4-3. A goal followed quickly from a short corner worked by Adi and Tess, resulting in the ball at Ysa's feet on the penalty spot.... 2-0. Then Firestorm pulled a goal back. The TG defence were so far into the Firestorm half that a clearance found two red attackers on the half way line with a 10 yard head start. Carrie nearly caught up but couldn't prevent the score moving to 2-1. TG were then under pressure for about 10 minutes until they pulled their socks back up and fired in two quality goals interspersed amongst many shots that missed, one from Olivia smashed against the post. Yovanna scored a goal of real quality, bursting through 3 challenges before hitting an unstoppable shot. Yoyo also got an assist on the 4th goal.... can't remember who scored it. Game done, some quality soccer today including Yoshi's patented reverse step-over and Carrie and Adi working the ball out of defence with short passes.

I spoke with the Firestorm coaches, they wanted to know which league we were in for spring, presumably so that they could choose a different one.

grrrrrrrr !

Eureka won the Association Cup.... congrats to them, but I think that means the Cup belongs to TG really

would like to see.....

some of these moves at the Association Cup, Jan 16th

turns_for_1v1

Association Cup - into the last 16

The TopGun juggernaut (otherwise known as Sally's Sequoia) stormed into Redding to play in the League stage of the Association Cup - the qualifying stage for the Champions League proper. I'm not sure that the Hilton Garden Inn was prepared for our girls.... but once they realised what they were dealing with, the staff did a great job of looking after us.

This was TopGun's first real away tournament, and it was a total blast. We played against teams we had never heard of, the parents got good time to talk and get to know each other, and the girls got to hang out and be themselves.

Anyway, there was some soccer involved as well. I'll put the result up front so that anyone who wasn't there doesn't suffer the tension of having to read reports before knowing what happened. TopGun won all their games and play in the round of 16 next weekend.

Game 1. 3-0 win over El Cerrito.

As with all teams in Redding, we had no clue about the quality of the team from El Cerrito. Even when we checked their record it was meaningless as their games were against other teams we've never heard of. I think El Cerrito may have checked TG's record though, as they played 11 in defence for the whole game. When TG had a corner kick, El Cerrito put all 11 of their players in the penalty box.... and were lucky that some rebounds did not end up in their net. TG started the game cautiously but once we saw that our goal was unlikely to be threatened switched to a more attacking formation. However, the score was 0-0 at half time - again we had struggled to break through a team playing for a 0-0 tie. So for the second half TG played 3-4-3 and it didn't take long for the extra attacking power to break through. Ysa scored 2 quick goals from the usual one v one situations and then Yovanna scored a goal that was all about hard work. The ball was crossed from the right, Yo missed a chance to shoot first time but then hunted down a defender who was trying the run the ball upfield, stole the ball, ran back into the penalty and scored with a defelected toe-poke into the corner of the net..... yay for toe-pokes !! 3-0 was the final score, and this turned out to be the largest victory in our bracket ( J ).

Game 2. 1-0 win versus Sonoma.

Sonoma had tied their first game 1-1 against Butte ( who were to be our final game ). Thus, this game would provide a good clue about what challenge we would face in the last game. Sonoma were clearly more skilled than El Cerrito and managed to get the ball near to our penalty box in the first 5 minutes. Again TG had started with a cautious line up and we maintained that against this more dangerous opposition. Unfortunately Lulu had to drop out of this game after 5 mionutes with a knee injury, and KK was out for about 20 minutes after a nasty fall. Gradually TG exerted more control on the game and kept the ball in the attacking half. Ysa and Alexia hit some shots that missed by inches, and then Cali hit a monster free kick from way outside the penalty box. The instructions were to aim for the cross bar.... Cali stepped back.... then stepped back a bit more.... than ran and launched one into the Sonoma penalty box. Their keeper just managed to keep the ball out of the goal using her finger tips and the TG strikers were unable to divert the rebound into the net, the ball dribbling inches wide.

For the second half, we kept in tight with a 4-4-2 formation, as although TG were dominant, Sonoma did pose a threat. The winning goal came from the move of the weekend. It started with a pass from right defence to center midfield by Yovanna. The ball was moved to Olivia on the center spot who spread it wide right to Cali. Cali moved the ball down the right, clipped it into the box where Olivia had sprinted to - she made a one touch flick to Ysa who nutmegged their keeper with another one timer. TG locked the game down after this and took the 1-0 win.

So, the situation at the end of Saturday was.... El Cerrito and Sonoma were out of it and could not catch TG. Butte were 2 points behind TG so needed to beat us in the sunday morning game.... time for Pizza, hot tub, cabernet, sleep etc...

Saturday evening was great. Lulu's knee was miraculously cured in the Hot Tub enabling her to perform some scary looking bomb dives. Talking of the Hot Tub, all 15 girls managed to fit in at once which must mean the sign about maximum occupancy was incorrect. Then Pizza arrived and parents and players sat together in the Hotel lobby relaxing.... then the girls went off to do whatever 12 year olds do and the parents chilled with some grape juice until the 9pm curfew.

game 3. 2-1 win v. Butte..... and through to the next round

TG went out with their most often used 4-4-2 formation and Butte had to win to progress, so no way were they going to play defensive against us. And it showed. With the more open field TopGun were raining attacks on the Butte goal. Crosses were coming in from all angles. Celine missed a tap in after 2 minutes and the ball spent a lot of time bobbling around in the Butte penalty box. What was also clear very quickly was that Butte were a good team. The girls were fast, skillful and could hit big kicks - which all showed up anytime TG let them have time on the ball.... but we are pretty good at not giving teams time on the ball. The breakthrough came following a battle in midfield - eventually the pall was pushed forward to Ysa who was in acres of space and through one on one against Bob..... A short note here about the Butte keeper - she was quite large, carried a lot of momentum and has possibly the biggest drop kick I have seen from girls of this age. However, I checked her driving license and she was qualified to play..... The Butte coach shouted at this point "uh, here's a goal", and he was correct. 1-0. TG continued to batter away at the Butte goal. Tess hit 2 rockets from outside the box which fizzed just over the bar... couple of inches lower and the keeper would have had no chance... then Cali hit a long ranger... this time the fingertips could only help the ball into the net.... 2-0. Then Lulu hit a long range shot into the net, only for the goal to be disallowed for offside.

Butte forced their way back into the game in the second half, playing some quite nice soccer, but TG still fashioned a bunch of goal scoring chances, some of which should have been converted. We can blame tiredness on some of those misses... I reckon its a good sign that our forwards worked hardest this weekend. Butte got a goal back and put lots of pressure on, but the defence and midfield worked hard to keep them out ( Butte needed 3 goals by now ). One scary moment saw Sierra make a good save and Jes clear up the rebound. We closed it out 2-1 and move on to play against Eureka in Morgan Hill next saturday.

The Association Cup results/schedule is below

http://www.t7sports.com:8080/2005/k139348.htm