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Saturday, June 15, 2002 Brits teach youngsters, even amid the mozziesBy MARK HARPER | News-Journal Staff Writer DELTONA — The 10 o'clock sun had evaporated the energy out of 8- to 10-year-old legs, and Ian Thompson called for a break. Some boys and girls playing a six-on-six match groaned, but eventually they settled in the shade, sipping cool fluids from cups as Thompson spoke to them. "Anyone get bit by a mozzie?" To which a chorus responded: "What's a mozzie?" "A mosquito," Thompson said. The Union Jack Soccer Camp — sales pitch: "Learn to play soccer the English way" — at Campbell Park in Deltona this week was filled with cross-cultural moments, exchanges about soccer and other stuff. Thompson, a dialysis technician, and fellow Brit Steve Glean, a Bethune-Cookman College accountant, took time off from their jobs and coached 41 boys and girls ages 6 to 14 for five long days, ending Friday. Glean, a native of Northampton, in the south of England, and Thompson, of Newcastle upon Tyne in the north, both learned soccer the English way. Glean played professionally in England and Thompson was a certified coach. Both find enjoyment in passing on their knowledge of the sport. Soccer the English way, by the way, is "a thinking man's game," Thompson said. It has served the Brits well thus far in the World Cup, where England advanced to play a second-round match against Denmark this morning. The United States' advance into that final round of 16 teams has given the sport a higher profile stateside, but Thompson said many of the kids in camp are admirers of the world's traditional elite, Brazil, Germany and Italy, too. Thompson and Glean both have been getting up in the middle of the night to watch games live from South Korea and Japan, then running around all day in the Florida sun trying to keep up with youngsters. Ten-year-old Steven Kelly said he got up at 4:30 one morning to watch Brazil play. His assessment: "It's more fun to play." Thompson emphasized fun, but his coaching technique involved freezing the action occasionally and reviewing all of the options players have, both offensively and defensively. On offense, he urged players once they get the ball to control it, look up at the field and make the easiest pass. Defensively, he drilled them on "marking your man goalside," or keeping one's body between an offensive player and one's own goal. During a break, he punted questions to his students, attempting to generate enthusiasm for the "chess match" aspects of the game. Some answered with vigor for a time, but a few minutes into the break, 10-year-old Katrina Ferchow asked Thompson: "Can we play now?" The coaches devised a mini-World Cup, with children representing different countries. And part of the fun was the camp's World Cup-like diversity. Children had roots in Cuba, the Ivory Coast and even merry ol' England. Deltona resident Webster Barnaby, whose 10-year-old son Adrian participated in the camp, is originally from Birmingham, England (home of singer Ozzy Osbourne). Adrian had played in a local league for a time, but his father said it was rife with politics and "soccer moms" more interested in getting on the executive board than with the kids having fun. "(Adrian) is excited about soccer now," Webster Barnaby said. Thompson said it was his goal to get kids "bitten by that bug." Soccer, that is. Not mozzies. HICI Special Report — Team Sports: Getting a Kick out of Soccer |
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