Sean Knoles
Contributed
We formed a girls travel team in Sooke that consisted of 12- to 14-year-old girls.
The purpose of this team was to give female soccer athletes a chance to travel to a tournament and set their skills against other teams from another country.
We formed the team having Terry Dennett, the assistant coach for the Intermediate A Shamrocks, Colleen Lembcke, Glyse Clarkston, Paul Homer, and Sean Knoles as team manager. Dennet offered a professional approach to the coaching by teaming up with the ladies who are terrific coaches in their own right.
We travelled to Seattle to the Starfire complex and competed in the 2015 Extreme soccer tournament. For some girls, this was their first time out of Canada and there was a feel of excitement in the air. The girls got a feel for what hard-playing, highly skilled teams play like. Though we didn’t win any of our three matches, we saw an improvement in every game played.
The girls didn’t get upset as they played teams that have been together for years and were part of select programs. We held our heads high and represented our town and our country as true athletes should.
When the idea for what became the Vancouver Island Football Club came to be, the mission of our program is to give athletes an opportunity to better their skills by offering the opportunity to see other teams outside of our own clubs and the Island. We wanted to create a platform that would allow these athletes to be seen and to showcase their skills.
As we proceeded through the season we have had interest from other clubs and people to work and travel with us. Our plans are to take two teams next year to one or more tournaments giving more opportunity to our aspiring athletes.
Congratulations to the ladies of the VIFC who showed that we can represent with pride and we can take our game to a new level.
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Sean Knoles is manager of the Vancouver Island Football Club