It can’t be that hard to win, right? Being defeated in a sport was almost impossible. That’s what our soccer team thought going into the season. Everyone knew we weren’t going to be the best in our new league, and we weren’t stacked with talent. But there was something we knew for a fact. We would win about half of the games, or at the least, win a few games. But defeated? That word never popped up in our team’s dictionary during the practices we held over the summer.
As the season grew closer, we practiced on technique of ball handling, passing, and shooting. Our team consisted of a few players that had experience playing travel soccer, a handful of players that had played Recreational soccer before, and most of the players who had never played in their lives, but wanted to try it out. The experience throughout the season wasn’t going to be in our favor. We knew we were going to have to fight through adversity, and a lot of it.
Our team started with three losses in our three preseason games, 2-1, 3-2, and 6-3. We were also thinking on the positive side, saying how we had the chance to win, but couldn’t close out the games. We had also scored in every single game, so we felt pretty good about ourselves.
The first game of the season was rough, but we managed to stay close. We ended up losing the game 2-1, even though we missed about five open shots. We moved on quick from that lost and fixed all the mistakes we made in the last game. Our next three games were against the toughest teams in our league. The next week and a half was going to be the toughest for us, and it showed as bright as the day. We lost the first game 6-2, next game 5-2, and then the last game 9-3. Everyone on our team was devastated. That was when we knew it was going to be a long season, and it might be possible for us to lose every single game of the season.
We had lost every game of the season, and whether it was close or a blowout, it was a loss. We were 0-13 going into the last game of the season against a team that we had lost to earlier in the season 3-2. We knew we had a chance, and thought about how bad it was if we went 0-14. We started out strong, scoring the first goal. The other team came right back though and scored off a penalty kick. It was tied     1-1 at half time. We can do this! We have a chance to end the season with our first win! As the second half started, they controlled the tempo and the ball. We struggled to get the ball, but when we did, we would take an ineffectual shot or turn it back over. As the game started coming to a close, the other team scored a goal. We still had one more chance! We controlled the ball, moving it down the field. One of our players got the ball inside the 18-yard box, shot, and scored! We were tied! We were looking to score another goal when the whistle blew which that ended the game.
Even though we had tied, we never won a game. We were devastated. In the beginning of the season, we didn’t think a defeated season was possible, even for a team like us. It seemed like we were trapped in a nightmare. But, for us, a defeated season was reality.