Page 33 - QARANC Vol 16 No 2 2018

Army Medical Services Ladies Football Team USA 2018 Tour
Between the 23 January and 6 February 2018, the AMS Ladies Football Team undertook a mid-season tour / training camp to the USA. The first phase of the deployment consisted of eight days in San Diego, with the final phase being five days in Las Vegas. Whilst I acknowledge that San Diego and Las Vegas are known as the centre of US Soccer, let me assure all of you that it was not just work, work, work and that the squad did manage some down time!
On arrival in San Diego we looked forward to a full itinerary, with two fixtures and three sessions in eight days. We undertook our first training session, sensibly moved from the relative cool 1000 hours scheduled start to the positively baking 1330 hours start. This one training session did not in any way prepare us for a fixture against the two times US National Soccer Cup Champions San Diego Sea Lions. Nevertheless, AMS held their own and despite being beaten didn’t let it dampen their spirits. It was an amazing opportunity to play against such a strong and tactical international side!
Refreshed we began to attend to our final fixture in San Diego against the University of California, San Diego Alumni. Having learnt nothing from our daytime training session, this fixture was scheduled for the mid part of the day also; it was going to be hot!
The opposition came at us hard and fast with several shots being taken early on. Luckily, all were saved. Private Housam then scored to put the AMS 1-0 up. In the second half the fitness of the AMS began to tell under the high temperature conditions. However, we dominated the game with two more goals, one coming from Lance Corporal Steel and the other one from Corporal Pawson. This was the AMS first international win for quite some time and a well-deserved win at that!
The final few days in San Diego followed the same pattern, with training sessions to develop the squad further and conditioning sessions held on the beach to ease off any niggles players may have picked up.
The trip to Las Vegas was exciting, 300 miles in a straight line along the interstate. Before we knew it, we had arrived at the Las Vegas strip, and, excited by being so close to
The team before the game at Kellogg Stadium (Private Portman, goalkeeper)
the strip, we decided to explore. In order to maximise our reputation and attention, we headed out in our AMS Football Polo shirts.
After a few minutes we quickly became bored at turning down the free drinks offered by the good people in Las Vegas and decided to continue with our evening at the famously cheap rooftop bar in the Paris Hotel, known as Chatu. A good night was had by all in which we bonded well as a squad before heading home early ready for the day ahead.
The following day attention switched back to the football, with a training session which took place at the Kellogg Soccer Complex on the outskirts of Las Vegas. Not only did we have an intense training session focusing on ‘pressing’ and ‘shooting’ but we were also fortunate to meet some minor celebrities, including ex Newcastle United goalkeeper Paul Barron.
With a spring in our steps, we were ready for the final game of the tour, against the University of Nevada. This game took place at the Peter Johann Memorial Field within the university campus; kick off was 1600 hours, and we competed throughout. On another day we would have taken some of our chances but despite the best efforts all round, we were eventually beaten 4-0. Yet again, another fantastic opportunity to play such a high-level international team.
The squad took advantage of all that Las Vegas had to offer over the final weekend. Some of us visited the Grand Canyon, some of us enjoyed fine dining at the local restaurants and we all managed to watch the ‘Superbowl’ game from the famous Caesars Palace resort. What an amazing way to end such a fantastic tour!
The tour was an experience for us all, knitting the team even closer together and enabling players to travel and experience things they would never have been previously able to before.
Private A Portman DMG(S)
THE GAZETTE QARANC 31
After a training session on Pacific Beach