Quake travelled to Ryde on Saturday to take on Phoenix for the clubs’ first hit outs of the pre-season. Considering these were the first games of futsal played in over 6 months the standard of play was, in many instances, surprisingly good. Brief reports of each match follow.

Academy

A good start for the boys. They played the ball around well and scored goals frequently while defending stoutly and limiting the opposition’s opportunities. The squad is a little older and a little bigger than last year and this should stand them in good stead against clubs that play a virtual second 12s side in the Academy.

12 Boys

The boys were over run in the first half conceding goals on the break. Their performance was better in the second half and they tightened their defence as well as scored goals. In the end they lost by about 4 goals. But the team was missing 3 key players so not too much can be read into the result other than there is more work to do before the season starts.

12 Girls

The girls had only 6 players with just 1 of them having played last year and the rest making their competitive futsal debut. Phoenix struggled for numbers and played a number of pre-academy girls who acquitted themselves well. Despite never having played together before our girls looked sharp and scored almost at will whilst not conceding a goal. The score line (the girls scored at least 12 goals) was pretty much irrelevant - the manner in which our girls played wasn’t. A very promising start for this squad.

14 Boys

To be honest, the boys struggled. Their inexperience showed. Whilst their technique is very good they will need to play smarter futsal to overcome the size deficiencies they may have against bigger, older teams. But they have the right coach to teach them and bring them along and we should expect to see a huge improvement over the coming weeks. Plenty of Purple Heart support and encouragement will help too!

14 Girls

With just one training run with only 5 girls under their belt, and this being their first time on the court together, the coaches just asked the girls to have fun. But the way they went about their business was exceptional. They won the game 3-2 in the end but the score would have blown out in the girls’ favour had Phoenix been able to play a ‘keeper instead of having their 14 Boys ‘keeper in goal. The girls worked hard and all 3 goals were scored from less than a metre out as a result of some good team futsal. My tip - watch these girls this year. They will surprise a lot of more fancied teams.

16 Boys

Very promising start for these lads. This squad is loaded with individual talent and when Jimmy gets them playing the way he wants then anything could be possible. Promising debuts from the new boys combined with strong performances from the old boys saw the lads lead 3-0 at the half and running out 7-3(?) winners. Looking forward to seeing these boys develop over the season.

16 Girls

Didn't play due to Phoenix Players outdoor commitments.

Youth

All the familiar faces were back and enjoying themselves. Again, these lads have had next to no training time together due to Symo having Futsalroos and Mounties commitments. Not a high quality game but the lads always looked likely to win. The score was locked at 1-1 at the half and it took another Shannon special for the boys to come away with a 2-1 win in the end. Not spectacular but a good start none the less.

Women

The girls won 2-0 in the end but the score line didn’t reflect their dominance. The Phoenix ‘keeper should have been earning double time and half with the amount of work she had to do whilst our ‘keepers spent most of their time organising their defence and rarely touching the ball. With 4 players unavailable and handfuls of chances not taken the room for improvement for the girls is huge. A nice hit out and well done girls.

Men

I think the final score was a 3-1 win but this didn’t reflect the boys’ effort. They hit the post at least twice and Symo missed a 6 metre penalty when he tried to kill the ‘keeper for the foul he committed to give the penalty away (and the one he got away with in the first half!). Again, with Futsalroo and outdoor commitments to keep the squad hasn’t trained as a whole yet so this effort was good considering.

Summary

With 7 wins from 9 the day was a good one for Quake. I’m sure Phoenix had just as many players missing as we had and we can expect improvement from them when we meet them in Round 2 of the Premier League. Plenty of work to be done on the training court in the meantime so make sure you get to training and work hard.

As always……GO QUAKE!

Tom Howell