August 24, 2009

Holy crap we won a soccer game

I have been playing recreational sports for two years -- three seasons of soccer and one season of floor hockey -- and none of my teams has ever won a game. The streak ended tonight when we beat our opponents 2-0.

Neither team scored in the first half, and we appeared to be evenly matched. Toward the end of the first half, one of their players pissed me off: I didn't know the rules for subbing in and out because this was the first time we've had enough women to sub, and she gave me this disgusted look and snapped at me like I was offensively stupid for asking at the wrong time.

I got angry -- mean girls push a button with me -- and suddenly I felt very strongly that we were going to win the game. I played probably the strongest second half I have ever played, partly because I'm finally in decent shape, and partly because I felt so determined that we would win. Our first goal was an all-female effort: I attacked one of their forwards and stole the ball, then another woman on my team passed it to a woman on our offense, and she kicked it into the net.

We scored again, and I realized that we were minutes away from a win. Usually I feel like the outcome of our games is out of my control, but this time I felt like I had to make sure I didn't screw up even once. Our defense was relentless -- we got in their way, chased them, stole the ball, blocked shots.

And we won! 2-0. They didn't even score, and we scored twice. When the game ended, one of my teammates announced "this is Di Di's first win ever!" and everyone congratulated me. What a great night.

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