Week Twelve, Manchester United

This week we played Man U on Pitch 2.

The winter ills and chills struck again and we only fielded 6 players...

Team 1	Team 2
William(c)	Natasha(c)
Felix	Jessica
Zaqiy	Zachary

With a guest from Man U playing with team 1, we ran 4v4 and 3v3 on two pitches.

Team one experienced a rather one-sided loss, but worked together well. Team two looked more convincing, with multiple goals apiece for Jessica, Natasha, and a Player of the Day goal-scoring performance for Zachary.

Check out our Week 12 slideshow:AV Week 12 on PhotoPeach

Week Eleven, Spurs

This week we played Spurs on Pitch 3.

It was good to have an almost everyone back on deck this week:

Team 1	Team 2
Caleb(c)	Nicholas(c)
Felix	William
Zachary	Raphael
Jessica	Mackay
Natasha	Kees
	Zaqiy

The Spurs team fielded 9 players so Zaqiy volunteered to help them balance out their squad - and played an outstanding game for them, looking very dangerous on defence!

We also saw some great goals scored by Raphael, Felix, Caleb, and a great Player Of The Day performance by William, showing an increased involvement in the mid-field and a willingness to attack the ball. Keep it up!

Check out our Week 11 slideshow:

Week Ten, Wolves

This week we played Wolves on the relocated(and somewhat muddier) Pitch 4.

With winter chills and ills still doing the rounds, each team had 9 players available, so we played 4v4 and 5v5 games.

Team 1	Team 2
Caleb(c)	Mackay(c)
Felix	William
Zachary	Jessica
Raphael	Zaqiy
	Nicholas

Team 1 had a great game with lots of goals coming for Caleb and Felix, and some great defensive and midfield play from Raphael and Zachary.

Team 2 had a harder game, but we saw some great persistent attacking play from Jessica, some good combinations in the mid-field from Mackay, William and Zaqiy, and an unbelievable steel-curtain Player of the Day effort, with save after save, by Nicholas on defence.

Check out our slideshow and gameplay video for Week 10.

Week Nine, Leeds

This week we played Leeds on Pitch 5.

Check out our slideshow for Week 9.

With lots of players away sick, AV and Leeds were each able to field 6 players for a well contested match. We saw some great attacking play from everyone, and spent most of the game in Leeds' half. Felix and Caleb came away with 2 goals apiece and Raphael also scored in the second half.



Our Player of the Day showing some great defence and getting to grips with the throw in ball, was Mackay.

Hopefully we see everyone back and feeling fit next week! Don't forget our photo session this Tuesday, when we will meet at Riverhills at 5:15pm. (Remember clean gear, including boots and socks!). So NO midweek practice this week.

Next Saturday - we play Wolves on Pitch 4. See you there!

Week Eight, Everton

After two weeks of cancelled games, we came back to play against Everton on Pitch 6.

Once again we had a few players away sick, but it was good to have Natasha back and straight into the action after a big break. We managed to field two teams for 4-and-5-a-side games with players from Everton helping us out on each pitch.

Felix found the back of the net 4 times on one, and we had a Player of the Day performance, with a goal and some great defence, from Caleb on the other.

Hopefully we see everyone back and feeling fit next week! Don't forget our photo session this Tuesday, when we will meet at Riverhills at 5:15pm. (Remember clean gear, including boots and socks!).

And don't forget our practices too - we've been playing some fast running 1v1 and 2v2 games, and some robbing the nest and great shooting and passing drills. Keep an eye out for the players who are at practice regularly - I think they're learning to use some tricky parts of their bodies, above the ankles! No practice this week though - be on time for the photos!

And this Saturday - we play Leeds on Pitch 5. See you there!

Week Seven, Arsenal

This week we had a hard game against a full strength squad from Arsenal on Pitch 6.

We had quite a few players away sick or with family commitments this weekend, so in the first half we played Jessica (c), Zaqiy, Raphael and Mackay on Pitch A in a 4-a-side format while Felix and Zachary joined a pickup team from Arsenal on Pitch B. In the second half we swapped Jessica and Zaqiy out to give Felix and Zachary a run with the Aston Villa squad.

Here is our Week 7 slideshow:

Some of our players were struggling to find their feet this week, but we might be seeing some fatigue from the coughs and colds that are doing the rounds. We saw some great defensive work from Raphael and a Player of the Day attacking performance in the first half from Zaqiy.

Hopefully we see everyone back and feeling fit after this week and we do some more work on our passing and attacking drills, following Zaqiy's example of keeping the ball heading toward the opposition end.

Next weekend we play Everton on the same pitch (6). See you all there!

Week Six, Newcastle

This week we played Newcastle on Pitch 5.

Thanks to Kerina for all the photos - lots of action shots.

Week 6 on PhotoPeach



This week we split the squad:

Team 1	Team 2
Zachary(c)	Kees(c)
Nicholas	Mackay
Caleb	William
Raphael	Daniel
Zaqiy	Felix
	Jessica

We had some outstanding play on defence from Nicholas and Kees, some great attacking play from Raphael and a really improved all round effort from everybody. Big thanks to Daniel and our Player of the Day, Jessica, for helping us out and playing a half for the other team.

Our passing drill is coming along. At practice on Tuesday we changed the diamond into a zig-zag down the field and the passes became relays to the goal, which seemed to work well.

Also a big shout out to our helpers at practice, Lachlan and Sebastian. It's great of you guys to come and share your skills with our team whenever you can.

Next week we play Arsenal on Pitch 6, see you there!

Week Five, Tottenham Hotspurs

This week we played Tottenham Hotspurs on Pitch 4.

It started out a lovely sunny morning but some cold rain blew in before the end of the first half!

Week 5 on PhotoPeach

We split our squad:

Team 1	Team 2
Felix(c)	Kees(c)
Nicholas	Jessica
William	Zaqiy
Zachary	Raphael
Mackay	Daniel
	Caleb

Both squads played a hard game against a fast passing, high scoring opposition. We saw some great work on defence from everyone including a hard stop using the stomach by Zaqiy and a great Player of the Day worthy effort from Zachary.

We also started work on a new passing drill where players pass and follow the ball around a diamond or triangle of cones. We will build on this drill in the coming weeks and be looking for faster, more controlled passing, and making the diamond bigger.

Week Four, Manchester City

This week we played against Manchester City on Pitch 3 on a pleasantly sunny autumn day.

AVW4 on PhotoPeach


We split our squad:

Team 1	Team 2
Felix(c)	Jessica(c)
Nicholas	Natasha
Caleb	Kees
Zachary	Raphael
Zaqiy	Daniel

I didn't get to see Team 1 play but they had a hard close game, with Felix and Nicholas finding the back of the net. Team 2 put together some great combinations with Jessica and Natasha making some long drives down field and some very determined work on defence by our Player of the Day, Kees.

We've had some good improvement on our juggling.

We still need to work on our nice high flat knees.

Don't forget to check the example video from our Practice Session.

At the practice we had during the break we introduced headers, so we will be including headers in the juggling test for next week. Check out this guy:

Week Three, April 16 2011, Leeds

This week we played against Leeds in the pouring rain!  Check out all our drowned rats in the photo montage.

AVW3 on PhotoPeach




Leeds had a lot of players away sick and could only field 5 players this week, so we split our squad:

Team 1	Team 2
Natasha(c)	Zaqiy(c)
Jessica	Zachary
William	Mackay
Felix	Caleb
Kees	Raphael

Team 1 played Leeds first while Team 2 played some 3v3 with Billy on the other pitch.  The teams swapped at half time so everyone got a turn playing against Leeds.

We saw some great running football from everyone - obviously nobody wanted to stand still in the rain! - with some great passing and goal scoring from Natasha and Jessica in the 3v3 game, and a Player of the Day worthy hat-trick from Felix in the first half.

We had our first "juggling skills" test with some great knee juggling from everyone - Zaqiy and Raphael are leading the way in this clip with some very good ball control and nice high flat knees! Keep it up, everyone, we'll be building our juggling repertoire during the season and keeping an eye on everyone's progress.

Practice Session Tuesday 12 April

We had a great practice session tonight with some passing and shooting drills and a quick 4v4 game.

This week's homework was knee juggling.  Check out this clip:

Remember to get those knees up nice and flat.  There will be a quick test for everyone after this weekend's game!

Week Two, April 9 2011, Blackburn

This week we had another glorious sunny morning to play Blackburn on Pitch 1. This also put us on BBQ duty although the Grade 6 team who were on before us had cunningly neglected to start the BBQ (they said it was broken!) so we only had to focus on drinks. So a big thankyou to the parents who helped staff the drinks counter.

This week we split the squad:

Pitch 1a	Pitch 1b
Kees (c)	Raphael (c)
Nicholas	Jessica
William	Natasha
Zachary	Caleb
Zaqiy	Felix
	Mackay

Blackburn were able to get a few goals ahead of us on each pitch but we saw some spirited defence from everyone, and Caleb was able to find the back of the net in the second half on Pitch 1b to keep Blackburn from running away with it completely.

Player of the Day went to Natasha, for some great pushes through and some outstanding throw-ins that found her team-mates and always put them in a good position down field.

Click to play our Week 2 slideshow on PhotoPeach!



Have a great weekend and we'll see everyone who can make it at practice on Tuesday night!

Week One, April 2 2011, Manchester United

Welcome to the first game of 2011! Up against Manchester United on Pitch 2.
Sorry I wasn't there so not as much detail with this update, but I had reports of some great football all around, including an excellent first game from our first Player of the Day for the season: Raphael.

Huge thanks to Aaron and family and Vickie for looking after the squad while I was away - and everyone else for helping it to run smoothly on the day.

Thanks to Genie Clementir and Tabrez Ali for the photos for Week 1.

Click to play our Week 1 slideshow!
Week 1 on PhotoPeach



Looking forward to the rest of the season!