Knuckle Down

First friendly off the mark. First loss off the mark and first bad performance off the mark too. Not a great start and not the one we wanted. In the burning heat of Saturday (now a distant rain-soaked memory) our style and substance melted away after 10 wonderful minutes and we ended up on the bad end of a 3-0 drubbing from league and local rivals. I won't lie to you all it was a grim post-match team talk, a concise and stark depiction from coach of just how far down the mountain of glory we've let ourselves slip and how much effort is required to get back up there. Grim. The good news though is that we know our problems, what we have to do to fix them, and how long we have to do that in.

It comes down to a simple currency that we have to get more liberal at spending: hard work. It's how we've done it in the past and it's present when we're at our best; working hard for each other. I'm confident that with a little bit of that voodoo magic we can turn that 3-0 upside down. The hard work is in evidence to be fair, some of the boys have been double training the last couple of weeks and everyone has been putting the effort in at training. At this point there is still a little rust needs shaking off but the whetstones seem to be out and we are in the process of sharpening and tightening up. I think it would be fair to say that everyone as an individual is getting a little frustrated with their game through this process but collectively we are still working together. Mistakes are often contagious, the key is to brush them off and right them for next time, heads on and heads up and maybe just maybe I'll be talking to you all about a lovely win and good performance next week!

All said about how bad we did it was nice to finally get some game time on Saturday, the hockey off season is a long one and I always seem to add at least a stone to my weight at various points in that gap, but no matter what fitness, drills, talks, mini games, or diagrams you work through nothing will get you sharpened up like a bit of game time. For me on a personal level it was a bad day, I missed a great chance at 0-0 (and by great I mean it was on the line) and kept missing my through balls and, as a consequence, had to chase a defender halfway down the field to recover every time (what kind of defender attacks?! It's bang out of order!). So, in summary my first touch and sprint resilience need to be improved drastically, bit of a shame that those are two of the most important things in my position but never mind, I'll keep trying.

So we're in a bit of an 'under construction' phase at the moment but just like a Tesco express that could face local planning permission protests from hippies we'll be built up, ready, and open for business as soon as possible.

Song of the week

A new feature for this year that I'm going to try out is the song of the week. In case you're a bit daft, this means that I'll be putting a song up that I think best sums up the previous week in my hockey world. Sometimes the song will be good, most of the time it will be dreadful, and if I get the chance to use some kind of cheeky pun I will: AT EVERY OPPORTUNITY. This week is a fairly safe choice as it is the first time I've run this amazing feature. It's a nailed on classic tune and to me represents our inability to hit the ground running on Saturday but also the recognition that we can turn things around. So without further ado the first ever Mighty Sale song of the week is... The Rolling stones- You can't always get what you want.

 See you all next week!