Youth Pan American Tournament in Uruguay 

March 10, 2010

Day 3

So, it was only 30 degrees today in the beaming hot sun. We learned from yesterday to apply the sunscreen before we leave the hotel and not just before we start running. Some of us put 6 layers on to keep the rays of sun off the skin. Needless to say we are all going to be coming home with interesting tans. Our day started off with a nice breakfast at 7am down in the hotel restaurant. From there we travelled on our bus to the sand base turf. We practiced from 9 to 11 with limited shade. It was a low key practiced due to our game later in the day. Practice went well, we worked a lot on short corners and by the end of practice our short corners were looking very professional.  Lunch at the polo club was awesome and we ate Pasta once again. We will probably be having more pasta in the next 14 days than we’ll have in an entire year.

Before our game we applied our layers of sunscreen and walked to the field. Before the team walked down to the turf, team Uruguay was standing around talking, Meghan and myself were very curious to what they were saying. I could pick up a few words and one thing they were saying was “On no Team Canada is coming, we have to look like we are actually doing something”,  I found this very funny.  After a really good warm-up we started our first exhibition match against the host country, Uruguay.  We had a lot of first game jitters, which showed up in our structure after Uruguay scored 2 goals by the end of the first half. But the second half was amazing! We got back to our structure and scored 3 bello goals. The first was a drag flick on a short corner scored by the amazing Alexandra McCawley, the second was scored by Emma, who dangled the goalie and finished with the ball in the net. The third goal was scored by a perfect set up from Bridget then passed to Maddie for an amazing pass to Emma then an incredible pass to Alex for our final goal! The game ended with a 3-3 tie. Both teams fought hard for the 3-3 tie, but we definitely ran the show in the 2nd half.  I guess in the southern American countries they like to give kisses after every game, to us we thought that was very weird and interesting and didn’t know how to react. Kendra’s face clearly showcased how different our cultures are and the way we do things. We did a cheer saying good game and such, as we did that team Uruguay began to laugh we were quite confused.

After the game was finished we worked our way back to the hotel in the bus. When we drove through town people always waved and stared at us. Tonight we had dinner at the hotel which was a lot easier because we didn’t have to try to understand the Spanish waiters. Tonight we are going to watch some Harry Potter and get some sleep. Good night Canada, ciao!  

Written by: Kyla Pronk #1 and Sarah Keglowitsch #3 of the Canadian U17 Women’s Pan Am team.