Getting Good at Soccer - Essay Example

This narrative will demonstrate just how a positive change in training habits can cause a player to become a better soccer player.

            When I was young, I was always elated at getting the opportunity of kicking the ball around the backyard with my father. I would especially look forward to the weekend when after I had finished working on all my chores, my dad would always reward me by taking me out to the park to play soccer with my friends; and if there was a soccer match being played near our home, he always made sure that he bought the tickets knowing very well that I would be very happy to go and watch the match.

            My soccer playing skills were however quite poor and I would often be kept as a substitute wherever our school team was playing against another team. This at times caused me to be quite despondent and my parents would often try to encourage me to not give up as I could improve and become a much better player.

            One winter morning, a new family moved into our neighborhood and I was elated to learn that the family had a young man about eight years my senior by the name of Todd who was quite a skilled player. Due to our shared love for football, Todd and I quickly became friends, and one day while we were kicking a ball around his backyard, Todd promised that he would help me get good at the game.

            Admittedly, I had always loathed playing but loved playing, however; Todd was quite the taskmaster when it came to coaching me. He would often cause me to do extensive workouts before even touching the ball arguing that I needed to first be physically fit. He took me through a lot of ball dribbling workouts and my game started to slowly improve. I watched a lot of training videos and was pleasantly surprised when with time; I discovered that I could now be able to dribble circles around my father.

            All this time while I was intensively training, I had so far never really been afforded the opportunity of finally getting to play for the school team due to my consistent absence from training as I chose to spend time training with Todd. One day, as I sat on the pitch-side bench at my usual spot as a substitute, I was surprised when our team coach selected me to replace a player who had been injured in a tackle. Our team had been lagging from a goal to nil and I could almost hear some of my teammates groaning with unmasked looks of sheer disbelief and disappointment when they saw me running into the field. However, about three minutes into the match, I finally got the ball and with an impressive burst of speed and skill, I was able to dribble past three defenders and score.

            All my teammates were surprised as they never suspected that I could be that good at playing soccer and at half-time, some even attributed my goal to some lucky chance. When we resumed playing in the second half, I was able to score two more goals and successfully lead my team to victory. Later on, as we were jubilantly celebrating in our dressing room my teammates kept on asking me just how I had managed to get to be so good at playing football. I told them to train harder as a positive change in training habits can cause a player to become a better soccer player.