Stanway Mini Soccer Festival

A week or so late I know, but a very big well done to all the kids from Forest Glade Blues and Forest Glade Reds who played in last weekends Stanway Soccer Tournament. The event was very well organised and run and was a fantastic experience for the players, coaches and the parents. The boys all played 4 x 20 min games over the course of the day, but then continued to knock balls around amongst themselves in between games as well!!! So they pretty much didn't stop for about 5 hours which resulted in some very tired legs by the final match.

 

This event was also our first opportunity to use the new "Kwik Fit" away kit for next season and it looked absolutely stunning. The Reds had a mixed day of results with 2 losses, 1 win and a very close draw, but the most important thing by far is that they all the kids seemed to really enjoy the event and all had a smile on their face at the end of the day. For the coaches it was a great learning curve for the forthcoming FG5's event and has also given us a bit more insight into the potential teams for next seasons entry into the Mini Soccer League.

 

At the start of the event the kids were all full of energy and excited about the matches ahead. Back Row : Owen, Darcy, Alfie and Alex. Front Row : Ethan, Max, Joshua and Ryan.

As the Under 6's are not allowed to play competitive games under FA Guidelines there was no winner/loser and as such no finals or knock-out stages. However all the kids were awarded a medal at the end of the event for their efforts. I think most of the kids also purchased souvenir photo frames and named footballs as well, so some great little memento's from their first ever football tournament.

 

End of the day picture with some very tired legs and some coaches with not much of a voice left. Back Row : Coach Jason, Michael and Dean. Middle Row : Owen, Ryan, Joshua and Alfie. Front Row : Ethan, Darcy, Max and Alex.

All the coaches are very proud of the performance from the kids. We all made some mistakes which we can learn from but there was also some magical bits of play on the field which just goes to show the huge amount of progress that the kids have made over the last year. We are very confident that we are going to have 3 good teams to enter into next season's league and are very excited about the future and the forthcoming FG5's tournament.