http://www.cnn.com/video/?hpt=hp_t2#/video/bestoftv/2011/11/29/exp-am-gupta-soccer-concussions.cnn
Dr. Gupta (click on video link above) says no more than 1300 head bumps with a soccer ball a year for kids. More can lead to American football type concussions. On the other hand, Malcolm Gladwell still insists to be really, really good at something -- say soccer -- one needs at least 10,000 hours of practice.
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Weekly update from Alice, November 29
Hello All,
Tonight Aaron Byrd 4:30-5:30.
Thursday practice 6-7:30, please see note below regarding drop off and viewing location.
Saturday
Game time 10pm please arrive by 9:30, wear BLACK, Field 3. Michigan Impact 00.
NEW PARKING FOR SILVERDOME DRIVERS -- OPDYKE to Featherstone and Turn Left. Go in Gate 5 on the corner and enter at Main Grill. Force coaches also recommend parents stay warm.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
depressing story about soccer hooligans in Argentina
From todays NYTIMES
BUENOS AIRES — Three fans of the soccer club San Lorenzo de Almagro slipped past security guards after a closed-door practice last month and berated players on the field for their recent losses.
Jonathan Bottinelli, a star defender, told the men to leave. One of them lunged at Bottinelli and punched him in the face. Another hit him from behind. A few teammates rushed in to stop the fight, Bottinelli and other players said, but the beating continued, leaving Bottinelli, a club fan since childhood, with doubts about ever again pulling on the red-and-blue San Lorenzo jersey.
More than a decade after England finally tamed the roving bands of hooligans that long ravaged soccer stadiums in Britain, fan-related violence continues to stain the sport in Argentina.
The unrest in part reflects an increasingly violent Argentine society, where street crime has been on the rise. But much of the violence can be traced to hostilities between rival factions of barra bravas, the Argentine version of hooligan fan groups that use fists, firearms and knives, and operate like mini-mafias. They engage in legal and illegal businesses, including selling drugs, often with the cover and complicity of the police, politicians and club officials, according to prosecutors and others who have studied them.
Barra bravas are blamed for many of the 257 soccer-related deaths in Argentina since 1924, almost half of which have occurred in the past 20 years, according to Let’s Save Football, a nongovernmental organization in Buenos Aires that is working to eradicate violence in the sport.
“We don’t feel safe inside of our stadiums in Argentina,” said Monica Nizzardo, president of Let’s Save Football. “That is why families have stopped going.”
The head of the San Lorenzo barra brava, Cristian Evangelista, led the attack on Bottinelli, players testified in court, though they refused to name the other barras involved. Club officials did not respond to requests for comment. After the episode, the Argentine government canceled San Lorenzo’s next match while officials investigated.
Soccer violence became so rampant in the past decade that officials barred visiting fans from attending all but first-division matches for four years. The prohibition was lifted in August.
Visiting fans are not always the problem. After the storied club River Plate lost a match in June, relegating the team to the second division for the first time in its history, its fans pulled apart their own stadium, throwing bleachers and metal poles onto the field as the police fired tear gas into the stands. Fans fought with one another and attacked reporters and the police, who used rubber bullets and water cannons to try to quell the chaos. An estimated 70 people were injured, including 35 police officers, and about 100 people were detained.
The tension was palpable at a second-division match in September between River Plate and Quilmes. Some 600 police officers set up roadblocks around the stadium to separate Quilmes and visiting River fans. After the match, Quilmes fans had to wait a half-hour for River fans to exit before being allowed to leave the stadium.
Asserting control over unruly fans is more complicated than in England, said experts who have studied soccer violence.
In England, many hooligans were working-class men looking for a weekend fight. In Argentina, the barra bravas have ties to politicians, the police and club management, and some of their leaders have gained the admiration of young fans. Politicians tap them as a “shock force” to muscle unions backing rival politicians. Prosecutors have accused barras of killing union workers.
“On Sundays they go to the stadium and wave the flag of the club to support the team,” said Gustavo Gerlero, a public prosecutor. “During the week they are giving support to politicians and union leaders as laborers and bodyguards by the very people that theoretically should be stopping them.”
The Argentine Football Association, the sport’s national governing body, said it was concerned about the barra bravas’ role in the violence. Nizzardo and others have criticized the powerful president of the association, Julio Grondona, for not showing the will to break the barras. Grondona, 80, has led the association since 1979, when Argentina was in the midst of a bloody dictatorship. He is also a senior vice president of FIFA, soccer’s world governing body.
Grondona, who officials said has been ill lately, declined to be interviewed. In an interview last year that appeared in an Argentine book, “Football and Violence,” Grondona said his association wanted to eradicate the barra bravas to “ensure normality in the stadiums.” And he said the clubs needed to institute “biometric” control of fans entering the stadium to “deepen the right of admission.”
A barra brava typically has a few hundred members. They chant songs and wave flags and organize the huge banners supporting their club. Away from the field they earn money from scalping tickets, parking cars, selling illicit drugs and, some prosecutors have said, taking a cut of the sale of players.
BUENOS AIRES — Three fans of the soccer club San Lorenzo de Almagro slipped past security guards after a closed-door practice last month and berated players on the field for their recent losses.
Multimedia
Joao Pina for The New York Times
A Quilmes fan, left, and a visiting River Plate supporter were searched thoroughly before being allowed to enter El Centenario stadium. More Photos »
More than a decade after England finally tamed the roving bands of hooligans that long ravaged soccer stadiums in Britain, fan-related violence continues to stain the sport in Argentina.
The unrest in part reflects an increasingly violent Argentine society, where street crime has been on the rise. But much of the violence can be traced to hostilities between rival factions of barra bravas, the Argentine version of hooligan fan groups that use fists, firearms and knives, and operate like mini-mafias. They engage in legal and illegal businesses, including selling drugs, often with the cover and complicity of the police, politicians and club officials, according to prosecutors and others who have studied them.
Barra bravas are blamed for many of the 257 soccer-related deaths in Argentina since 1924, almost half of which have occurred in the past 20 years, according to Let’s Save Football, a nongovernmental organization in Buenos Aires that is working to eradicate violence in the sport.
“We don’t feel safe inside of our stadiums in Argentina,” said Monica Nizzardo, president of Let’s Save Football. “That is why families have stopped going.”
The head of the San Lorenzo barra brava, Cristian Evangelista, led the attack on Bottinelli, players testified in court, though they refused to name the other barras involved. Club officials did not respond to requests for comment. After the episode, the Argentine government canceled San Lorenzo’s next match while officials investigated.
Soccer violence became so rampant in the past decade that officials barred visiting fans from attending all but first-division matches for four years. The prohibition was lifted in August.
Visiting fans are not always the problem. After the storied club River Plate lost a match in June, relegating the team to the second division for the first time in its history, its fans pulled apart their own stadium, throwing bleachers and metal poles onto the field as the police fired tear gas into the stands. Fans fought with one another and attacked reporters and the police, who used rubber bullets and water cannons to try to quell the chaos. An estimated 70 people were injured, including 35 police officers, and about 100 people were detained.
The tension was palpable at a second-division match in September between River Plate and Quilmes. Some 600 police officers set up roadblocks around the stadium to separate Quilmes and visiting River fans. After the match, Quilmes fans had to wait a half-hour for River fans to exit before being allowed to leave the stadium.
Asserting control over unruly fans is more complicated than in England, said experts who have studied soccer violence.
In England, many hooligans were working-class men looking for a weekend fight. In Argentina, the barra bravas have ties to politicians, the police and club management, and some of their leaders have gained the admiration of young fans. Politicians tap them as a “shock force” to muscle unions backing rival politicians. Prosecutors have accused barras of killing union workers.
“On Sundays they go to the stadium and wave the flag of the club to support the team,” said Gustavo Gerlero, a public prosecutor. “During the week they are giving support to politicians and union leaders as laborers and bodyguards by the very people that theoretically should be stopping them.”
The Argentine Football Association, the sport’s national governing body, said it was concerned about the barra bravas’ role in the violence. Nizzardo and others have criticized the powerful president of the association, Julio Grondona, for not showing the will to break the barras. Grondona, 80, has led the association since 1979, when Argentina was in the midst of a bloody dictatorship. He is also a senior vice president of FIFA, soccer’s world governing body.
Grondona, who officials said has been ill lately, declined to be interviewed. In an interview last year that appeared in an Argentine book, “Football and Violence,” Grondona said his association wanted to eradicate the barra bravas to “ensure normality in the stadiums.” And he said the clubs needed to institute “biometric” control of fans entering the stadium to “deepen the right of admission.”
A barra brava typically has a few hundred members. They chant songs and wave flags and organize the huge banners supporting their club. Away from the field they earn money from scalping tickets, parking cars, selling illicit drugs and, some prosecutors have said, taking a cut of the sale of players.
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Weekly reminder from Alice -- equilibrium restored!
Happy Thanksgiving Everyone,
We do have Aaron Byrd tonight 4:30-5:30.
Friday the Turkey Shoot Out at Total Soccer Royal Oak, for those girls who have signed up.
I will send out play times when I get them. Go Team 248 (Kate, Jill, Christina, Sophia)
Enjoy your day with friends and family and create memories that last a lifetime.
Saturday, November 19, 2011
The Road without soccer
I just woke up horribly confused and disoriented. I have no weekly update from Alice! No soccer this weekend! No blog hits whatsoever! What to do? The world feels desolate, quiet, empty, post-apocalyptic.
Thursday, November 17, 2011
Sepptic soccer
My father, I recall, was forced to retire at 65. This felt harsh at the time. But there were good reasons laws and practices developed over time that nudged one generation aside so the next could take over. Simply put, whatever the accomplishments of one generation they do tend to lose touch with the times. And, after a certain age, the tendency is to start to believe in your own infallibility, your own need to respond to others.
The response of the 85 year old American football coach Joe Paterno to his recent scandal is a remarkable case in point.
Sepp Blatter, the 75 year old head of FIFA, and thus at least the figurative head of all soccer, is another. Excerpted below is his recent gaffe denying racism in soccer and his even more bizarre suggestion that racial slurs should be met with a handshake at the end of the game.
For women footballers: this is the guy who also suggested shorter shorts for women to increase attention to the game. He is literally a walking laundry bag of pre-War European cant on race, sex and ethnicity.
Excerpted from *The Daily Mail*
Asked directly by a CNN reporter if racism exists on the pitch, Blatter denied it and said such incidents should simply be settled by a handshake at the end of the match.
'I would deny it,' he said. 'There is no racism, there is maybe one of the players towards another, he has a word or a gesture which is not the correct one, but also the one who is affected by that, he should say that this is a game.
'We are in a game, and at the end of the game, we shake hands, and this can happen. On the field of play sometimes you say something that is not very correct, but then at the end of the game you have the next game where you can behave better.'
To a reporter from Al-Jazeera he simply compounded the situation.
'During a match you may say something to somebody who is not exactly looking like you,' he said. 'But at the end... it's forgotten.'
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2062489/Sepp-Blatter-resign-claiming-players-forget-racism-handshake.html#ixzz1dy9zAALy
The response of the 85 year old American football coach Joe Paterno to his recent scandal is a remarkable case in point.
Sepp Blatter, the 75 year old head of FIFA, and thus at least the figurative head of all soccer, is another. Excerpted below is his recent gaffe denying racism in soccer and his even more bizarre suggestion that racial slurs should be met with a handshake at the end of the game.
For women footballers: this is the guy who also suggested shorter shorts for women to increase attention to the game. He is literally a walking laundry bag of pre-War European cant on race, sex and ethnicity.
Excerpted from *The Daily Mail*
Asked directly by a CNN reporter if racism exists on the pitch, Blatter denied it and said such incidents should simply be settled by a handshake at the end of the match.
'I would deny it,' he said. 'There is no racism, there is maybe one of the players towards another, he has a word or a gesture which is not the correct one, but also the one who is affected by that, he should say that this is a game.
Eye of the storm: Sepp Blatter embraces FIFA member Tokyo Sexwale
To a reporter from Al-Jazeera he simply compounded the situation.
'During a match you may say something to somebody who is not exactly looking like you,' he said. 'But at the end... it's forgotten.'
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2062489/Sepp-Blatter-resign-claiming-players-forget-racism-handshake.html#ixzz1dy9zAALy
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
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Force 00 Purple U13G Div B Winter 1 2011 |
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Saturday, November 12, 2011
November 12, PSG
Prince Hamlet in his first soliloquy:
"O God, God,
How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable
Seem to me all the uses of this world!
Fie on't, ah fie! 'Tis an unweeded garden
That grows to seed. Things rank and gross in nature
Possess it merely. That it should come to this!"
Well, it wasn't that demoralizing, but....
The Force U12 took a 1-0 loss this early AM to an inferior side, the PSG Gators. The girls were playing shorthanded without the very active Annabelle and Christina, but this was a team they could have and should have beaten -- particularly when they need a win so badly.
The team certainly seems to need to somehow regroup at this point.
The girls played really well in the first half. Rhea put on an offensive clinic: beating players, distributing the ball, finding space, etc. When in the game Zoe absolutely controlled midfield. On the backline the girls did some very nice backpassing and even switching of the field. Grace had her second excellent game on defense. Kate came up with a great save off a free kick, extending to her full height to snag a hard, high bouncing ball.
The second half had its highlights: Jill was a notable spark on offense; Kate made one great diving save; Grace made a great run to interrupt a breakaway; and Zoe, in limited time early in the half, again dominated the middle.
But other than that nothing went particularly well.
The middle of the field was left all too open and clearing passes routinely went sailing past defenders who were put back on their heels. One of these balls skidded too close to Kate for a backpass and a Gator came up with the easiest goal she will ever get. Offensively, nothing got moving for the Force and girls struggled, again, to realize game situations. That is, they seemed unaware that late in the second half they were down 1-0 and needed a tie.
"O God, God,
How weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable
Seem to me all the uses of this world!
Fie on't, ah fie! 'Tis an unweeded garden
That grows to seed. Things rank and gross in nature
Possess it merely. That it should come to this!"
Well, it wasn't that demoralizing, but....
The Force U12 took a 1-0 loss this early AM to an inferior side, the PSG Gators. The girls were playing shorthanded without the very active Annabelle and Christina, but this was a team they could have and should have beaten -- particularly when they need a win so badly.
The team certainly seems to need to somehow regroup at this point.
The girls played really well in the first half. Rhea put on an offensive clinic: beating players, distributing the ball, finding space, etc. When in the game Zoe absolutely controlled midfield. On the backline the girls did some very nice backpassing and even switching of the field. Grace had her second excellent game on defense. Kate came up with a great save off a free kick, extending to her full height to snag a hard, high bouncing ball.
The second half had its highlights: Jill was a notable spark on offense; Kate made one great diving save; Grace made a great run to interrupt a breakaway; and Zoe, in limited time early in the half, again dominated the middle.
But other than that nothing went particularly well.
The middle of the field was left all too open and clearing passes routinely went sailing past defenders who were put back on their heels. One of these balls skidded too close to Kate for a backpass and a Gator came up with the easiest goal she will ever get. Offensively, nothing got moving for the Force and girls struggled, again, to realize game situations. That is, they seemed unaware that late in the second half they were down 1-0 and needed a tie.
Thursday, November 10, 2011
U13G Div B Winter 1 2011 Standings |
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FRIDAY NIGHT
Technical training 6-7:30 in the Mini Dome at the Silverdome.
SATURDAY MORNING GAME
8:00 AM game, please arrive by 7:30. Wear WHITE, bring black, Field 1 PSG Gators.
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