What a great day that was! It was a real pleasure to have coached both A and B teams and then see them do well at the Inner City Tournament.

The A's had an early wake-up as we met eventual winners Pt Chev in our first game and lost 2-0. We did much better in our second game v St Francis, losing 3-2 but we were starting to play as a team and with belief - especially as we had now scored some goals. 

We took this to the next level in our next game, getting our first win v Marist 2-1 and then really turned on the style to beat Newton 4-1. This placed us 3rd in our pool and so we had a play-off v the 3rd place team from the other pool - local rivals Ponsonby. After taking an early lead, Ponsonby really pressed us and we were losing 4-1. That's when the Grey Lynn team spirit really kicked in! We just went for it and took the game to them, again and again and again. We not only fought back to 4-4, but then took the lead to be winning 5-4 with minutes to go. Ponsonby came back to make it 5-5 and we just couldn't make our last couple of chances count so we settled for an honourable draw in which was probably the most exciting and even game of the tournament. 

I was so proud of the great, flowing, passing football we played, the awesome goals we scored and the maximum effort put in by every player. Well done, you guys rock!! 

Player of the Day goes to Sam Bridgeman for his tireless running and 2 goals. The most Improved Player was Jed Kuegler for his outstanding work in defence and midfield. Many thanks to Jake Criscillo's dad Mike for being so much help on the day.

The A team were: Sam Coulter (captain), Jojo Lewis, Noah Fa'alogo-Lilo, Jed Kuegler, Frankie Speers, Ben Aspen, Luca Keenan, Sam Bridgeman, Jake Criscillo, and Jake Dunsdon.

The B team were drawn in a very tough pool and suffered heavy loss to finalists Bayfield and Westmere. They then rallied to get a win v Freeman's Bay 3-1 which they totally deserved. The B's fought hard in their last game v Ponsonby and did Grey Lynn proud despite the loss. I loved their positive attitudes, great team spirit and they took away a lot from the experience. 

There were some heroic goalkeeping performances, especially from Rhys Keenan and Stanley Chilwell Clarke (both of whom also scored goals!) and every player gave their all for the team. The Player of the Day was Lucy Carroll who led by example in every game and the most improved play was Alba Erikson aka the 'Albanator' - who just got stronger and stronger game after game!

The B team were: Lucy Carroll (captain), Manu Moa, Rhys Keenan, Stanley Chilwell Clarke, Anya Taylor, Alba Erikson, Rory Hannah and Ali Jabbar. Many thanks go to Rhys and Luca's dad John for his great work in managing the team on the day. 

Thank you to all the parents who gave lifts and supported us throughout on a sunny and memorable day for everyone involved.