MADRID DAY 6

Today marked the 12th day we've been away, and I was feeling it a little bit.  I didn't wake up super great, but I've also been up late nights to take care of club stuff and of course updating the blog.  We ate breakfast, luckily it wasn't until 9:00, then got ready to go to Santiago Bernabeu Stadium, which is where Real Madrid plays.  I'll be honest, it was pretty surreal to be there.  To imagine that's where some of the top players in La Liga and Champions League play.  I was disappointed that we couldn't spend more time there to soak everything in, but it was still so awesome to even have the experience at all.

The stadium really is so amazing to step inside of.  They have people mow the grass with push mowers.  That's how much they take care of the field.

We toured all the trophies and memorabilia.  They had some HUGE trophies, but for some reason I didn't get any pictures of it.  I think we were rushed through because we had to be back at the bus at a certain time.  All in all, there was some awesome history we saw.

I'm pretty sure I'm sitting where Ronaldo has been.

This is the SDI group out on the field... sort of.

After the tour, we got about 10 minutes to shop at the Real Madrid super store.  Yeah... that wasn't enough time.

Tonight we had our second matches.  We played against the Real Madrid Tech Camp.  They were good.  I coached the U15 team today, and they had their work cut out for them.  We had some challenges as we battled sickness, injuries, and some Spanish guest players.  We basically played two 35 minutes games.  The first game we lost 2-0.  We just made some defensive mistakes, one created by one of the Spanish players, the second goal was actually offside, but we only had one center ref.  The second game we lost 2-1.  We played better, but again made some mistakes and didn't mark far post, then didn't get proper clearance which led to the second goal.  We had our opportunities as well, but just didn't get it to fall our way.  The Utah/Bayern boys played fairly well.  They each did some good things, but each have some room for improvement.  I'm still proud of them, and can see the growth in their game.  The U14's won their game 3-1.

Here's a group pic after the matches with the opposing U15 teams.

After dinner at the hotel, we had a surprise room inspection.  Each coach supervised a floor as the boys were instructed to wait outside their rooms for Coach Neil to come inspect.  I was assigned the 3rd floor, which only had one of the boys' rooms, along with the coaches' rooms.  This room happened to be Alex's, Ryo's and Nathan's.  They were hilarious.  Alex was pacing the whole time, and Ryo would just drop his head agains the wall.  Nathan was completely oblivious.  Their room ended up not being "bad" compared to some of the others, but it wasn't great, either.  Our goal is to teach these boys to take pride in their lifestyle, and I'm trying to stress the stink factor.  These boys are so smelly.

Not a lot of pics today, but I do have some player interviews.  Here's the questions of the day...

QUESTION 1

Sly: "How do you think you played today?"

Alex: "It could have been better, but I think I fixed what Coach Neil was kind of asking me to do, so that was better improvement."

Marshall: "I think I could have done better.  I should have ran more."

James: "It was good.  I haven't played this position for awhile.... or at all."

Sly:  "You did well... way to step up and fill in."  (James has been playing Right Outside Back)

Alex:  "Saturday Kyle will be back, so..."

Sly: "Yeah, Saturday will be better."

Alex: "Kyle will be playing Outside Back on Saturday."

James:  "REALLY?!"  *Huge smile

Alex:  "That was like... the most excitement I've seen James have ever."

James:  "I want to score in Spain SO bad."

Brandon: "I don't think I did very good, honestly."

Sly:  "Why?"

Brandon:  "Because I was out of position a couple of times, and the outside runner got around me a couple of times as well."

Sly:  "What do you think you did well?"

Brandon:  "I think my short passing was well, and my two touch passing."

QUESTION 2

Sly: "So far, we've got two full days left, what do you miss about home?"

Alex: (without missing a beat) "American television, and free water at restaurants."

Marshall:  "Food."

James: "I don't know... probably nothing.  I miss having coffee in the morning."

Brandon: "Well I've already seen my family, I've done FaceTime.  The only thing I miss, probably would be the dogs."

Sly:  "The dogs?  People don't count, it's the dogs?"

Brandon:  "Yep."

I'll add to what I miss.  I miss my workout schedule and I REALLY miss doing laundry.  I have a need to have clean clothes at all times.  Washing in the sink just doesn't cut it.  I think I miss my shoe collection too.

As frustrated as I may have been at times, the day ended well.  The group from Florida have treated me so well.  Kevin and Nikki Schoensee, who is little Sammy's parents really made my night, as well as Coach Felix.  I walked down to the lobby to get a Kit Kat out of the vending machine, cause chocolate helps me feel better sometimes, ha ha, and there was that group at the bar area chit chatting.  They invited me over, and we got to talking.  Kevin started it off commending me on my job coaching the 15's.  I obviously hate to lose, and didn't take the loss too lightly, but the fact that he saw the adversity I had to deal with was huge.  Coach Felix has been such a huge support as well, and I'm so grateful to be on this journey with him.  I can only hope to continue to build these new relationships that have been formed.  There's so many great people out there.  I'm really lucky to have this experience, and I have Coach Neil to thank for believing in me and trusting me.  Two more days to soak it all in.

"Experience is not what happens to you; it's what you do with what happens to you."

-Aldous Huxley