
Youth had a taste of the real spirit of a football club
What beautiful weather yesterday and setting for our youth-friendly match last Saturday. It is always nice to be able to play on real grass… It was great to see the majority of the senior team come to support our youth academy players. While they themselves suffered a heavy loss in the SIFL a few minutes before, it would have been easy for them going back home… Instead many of them stayed back and gave advice to the youngest. That’s the spirit of a real football club!
As it was a 7 aside match. As always our focus was to build-up from the back, going through the midfield with fast and simple passes and using the wings to get through YKFC’s defense with one or two players in the box to finish it off. We had good spells but also sometimes we took it too easy in defending. YKFC was better on the day in finishing the opportunities we did have most of the ball possession but found it hard to be dangerous in the box. The final result was 4-2 for YKFC in the end and we can learn from our mistakes to play better next time.
After the match, the seniors challenged the academy in a penalty shoot-out and the youth lost it 6-5. It was a close encounter but also nice to see the interaction between youth and senior players… This is the true spirit we want to give within Shanghai Lions Football Club. Also, remember it’s only a matter of time before the youth to win against the seniors 😉
As Nick mentioned we did a hard F45 session Sunday before and we think these sessions are very good to build core and mental strength. The players who attended did a great job and worked very hard. Well done Lions!
We go back to the training on Thursday and working on friendlies vs DEQ (Friday evening) and Juventus 11 aside (Sunday afternoon on November 15th, 2020)
Good work Lions
Freek, Pat & Nick