Englanneksi, niin että voitta oppia englantia.

The first game of the season caused quite some problems for us. Having only a squad of 12 in general is already very difficult, if you play 11v11. But on top, our tournament victory in Nivala on Saturday cost us two additional injured players. On Sunday, we knew that we would have only 8 players available. We asked KPV to postpone our game, but they said that it is not possible.

On Monday morning, we thought that we would have to go to Kokkola with only 8 players. Luckily, we got 3 players from our T05-06-team. With that, we had 2 x 03-girls, 4 x 04-girls and 5 x 05-girls available for the game. Not only that:

Siiri and Anette played the tournament on Saturday, two Helmari 05-games on Sunday and now on Monday.

Oona K., Oona M. and Janita from the 05-team played two Helmari games on Sunday and now on Monday.

All other players played the tournament on Saturday and now on Monday.

KPV has a nice, big football hall with artificial grass. Our last training on artificial grass was... well, long before I came to Ylivieska in November. As long as I am here, we didn't have one training with real football goals. All in all, you understand now that we had a very difficult situation.

No surprise that we lost this game 5-0. But the result sounds much worse than it was. We had plenty of attacking possibilities. But if you don't shoot at the goal, you cannot score. KPV on the other hand did 3 of their goals with distance shots. I've been saying for years that it is not helpful for juniors to play football on big goals with keepers that are not even half the length of the goal. Nothing is learned if you score goals just because the keeper is too small to catch a high ball. I would much prefer it if FIFA's rules would support learning proper football by - for example - inventing a new goal which is a mix-size between junior goals and adult goals. But I digress.

KPV was much fitter than our team, even without our extra games during the weekend. That is no surprise. Their football hall is so big that 4 teams can train at the sime time and they still have more space than we have as a maximum in Ylivieska. ;) It's just how it is. Here come some noteworthy happenings of the game. I'm focussing on our game and only mention some of KPV's attacks. I suppose that they write their own report.

5. min. Siiri passes the ball through to Siina who runs alone to the goal, but the keeper does a very good libero job and comes out 25 meters to get the ball

6. Siina runs again towards the goal, but doesn't shoot. Eventually a defender pushes her to the side

8. First dangerous scene for KPV after a very good through pass behind our lines, luckily it was a few cm offside

9. A whistle of the referee during a scene in our penalty area. Penalty? No. Apparently, it was an unintentional whistle and thus the game continues with referee's ball

10. D-junior Janita plays a brave game as a right defender. It's her first real 11v11 on the big field, but she already acts like an experienced C-junior

11. The first players start getting tired. Huge holes within our lines occur. Still 70 minutes to go though...

12. Another great through pass from KPV and it looks like a striker can go through to our goal. Out of nowhere, Ilona comes to the rescue and kicks the ball to the side. But we're not safe yet. A distance shot makes its way through all players, but right winger Ronja suddenly appears on the goalline and kicks the ball away. How did she even get there? Did Scotty beam her there? You're probably too young to understand that reference. Anyway, you think that was all? Think again. The ball bounces back to a KPV-player and a second shot makes its way to the goal. Who kicks it from the goalline again? That's right: Ronja. Maybe she has a device to stop time and secretly move to the right spot?

14. In an odd situation, our left defense side stops playing right in the middle of a KPV-attack. If no one attacks you in the opponent's penalty area, what do you do? You score a goal, of course. 1-0 for KPV

17. The third dangerous through pass from KPV. This time, Pinja rushes out of the goal and kicks the ball away a second before the striker

20. More players start to get tired. The holes get even bigger. There is no midfield line anymore. Well, only 60 more minutes to go. What could go wrong...

21. The team starts a wonderful counter attack after Ilona wins a ball in the center and quickly transports it forward. A pass to the left to Anette is immediately forwarded to Siiri who sends Siina towards the goal. All alone, it is Siina vs. the keeper. And the keeper wins again with a quick reflex

23. KPV's first corner leads to a fast counter attack for us with a double pass between Siina and Siiri. Again, the needed shot to the goal does not happen and the defense eventually stops our chance

25. KPV slows down their pace quite a bit. We're definitely not unhappy about it...

26. ...as our midfield has completely fallen apart by now. Janita is overrun on her side again and again, but she stays strong and pushes herself into the game. Quite a strong first time-performance from her, respect!

27. Probably the most controversial scene of the whole game: Siiri is all through on the left wing and gets knocked down by KPV's keeper-libero who was the last player some 22 meters in front of the goal. I was saying to myself: Hopefully, the referee doesn't give her a red card. Yellow card suffices. Instead he gave a free kick for the keeper. I'm still confused about it while I write these lines...

31. As KPV played an extreme offense pressing, this naturally led to huge free space behind their defense line. Basically, their whole half belongs to the opponent if they play like that. Again and again we were able to exploit their high pressing. We just didn't have the power today to finish our attacks. Just like in minute 31 when Siiri ran alone towards the goal from the middle line. Her final shot is without power and lands in the secure keeper's hands

34. A lucky shot from 25 meters hits our goal right under the crossbar. No one prevents the shot and Pinja has no chance to get the ball as it makes an uncatchable curve above her. 2-0 for KPV

36. Halftime. 4 minutes early, but fine with us... ;)

I suggested one idea for the second half and I'm happy to say that Ronja tried my idea three times. No luck with it, but I'm glad that my message came through to her.

I continue the report with minute 1 again, because I don't know did the second half start with minute 37 or 41. ;)

4. Leonna tanks herself down the left wing before she eventually passes the ball to Anette. A good shot to the goal, but the keeper once again has the upper hand. Literally. ;)

6. Another through pass from KPV in combination with wrong defense behaviour from us et voilá, 3-0 for KPV

7. Anette dribbles against 4 and sends a cross towards the goal. Who's there? Their keeper, of course. She's everywhere, it seems...

14. The quality of the game lowers itself by the minute. It looks a bit like both teams are already waiting for the final whistle. Anette tries to wake up her team with a pass to Siiri. The situation is then Siiri or the keeper, who will be earlier at the ball? By 2,68 cm, it is the keeper

15. Another dangerous chance for KPV, but Ilona stops the attack like an old-school central defender. Hyypiä-style

20. Anette puts a freekick behind KPV's defense line to her sister, but Siina misses the ball oh so slightly. Instead who gets the ball? Let's say it together: 1, 2, 3, keeper!

24. Siiri is, sorry for repeating myself in this report, all alone on her way to KPV's goal. And again, her various games on Saturday and Sunday are still in her legs and lead to a too lightweight shot, an easy catch for... imagine a cinema trailer like for those super heroes, big letters flying towards the viewer, explosions and whatnot everywhere, and then the name of the movie and this old man who speaks all those trailers... "It's THE KEEPER. Rated PG."

26. Let me quickly copy and paste something from minute 34... I'm back! A lucky shot from 18 meters hits our goal right under the crossbar. No one prevents the shot and Pinja has no chance to get the ball as it makes an uncatchable curve above her. 4-0 for KPV

27. The second corner for KPV. That's also the last corner of the game. None for us

34. After an insecure first half in her first big field game ever, Oona K. plays more lively in the second half. Her best scene is a nice pass forward to the right wing where Siina has once again a 1v1 with the keeper-libero. This time is the only time that the keeper doesn't get the ball. Unfortunately, Siina's chip also misses the left post by a few cm. No luck today for us

37. After Ilona initialises an attack through the middle, the defense blocks the shot, but the ball bounces back to Kiia who tries a direct attempt at the goal, but the ball goes wide to the right. But a nicely quick reaction it was nonetheless

38. The last thing this game needed was another goal. And again, it was a distance shot from about 22 meters that made its way into the goal, this time a nice flat shot, exactly at the most left possible corner of the goal. Pinja jumps as far as possible, but the goal is simply too big, 5-0

All in all, the win for KPV was deserved, because they had a much better fitness than us. But out of the game, we ran more often towards their goal than they did to ours. If you take our physical condition on that day and our disastrous training situation during the whole winter and Spring, this surprised me a bit. If you consider that goals 2, 4 and 5 were all shots from the distance, I think we did quite a good job, given the situation. Goals like that happen in C-juniors levels as long as the football rules are as they are. There is no shame in getting such goals. And of course - and that was today the biggest difference between KPV and us aside from the physical condition - you have to shoot at the goal if you want to win. We ran and ran and ran towards the goal, but we didn't shoot. KPV shot and scored. That made the difference and them the deserved winners.

Nonetheless, I think that we can be proud of our performance. 5 x 05-girls on the field, no substitutes, no outside or grass training since October. We did what we could and gave our best. That's all a coach can ask for. Big up, pikut leidit!