In our neighborhood at the end of the 1970s we liked to play soccer, but we didn't have the facilities. After a bitter fight we finally got permission to operate floodlights at night on our asphalt court.
Notions of wide pitches, of clubs and leagues, were mere fantasies, but one day, out of the blue, someone decided that the primary school kids would get a coach. He would come twice a week, maybe three times, and teach them fundamentals. Nice, right?
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Being nice kids, we would clear the court for the smaller kids before the class, so they could get some kicks in, and we would go to the basketball court beside it.
The court was at the edge ificial hills of sand intended to separate it from the main road beyond. One day, at the foot of the hill appeared a man in his twenties, his origins unclear, bear-like in appearance and slipping here and there in the sand. He sported tennis shoes and a gleaming track-suit, and a whistle hung around his neck. Here was a coach. A young guy doing some moonlighting seemed to us a reasonable scenario.
But what most excited us was his folder - that is, his stack of folders.
Under his right arm, this coach was grasping piles of tactical material, sketches and diagrams, intended for this dirty dozen lacking even a name for itself.
Somehow, after only a few warm-up drills, those same runts were transformed into the living, panting embodiments of Coach's diagrams, bobbing between positions, weaving among cones, hitting marks as if they were Liverpool blazing toward another cup. If my memory serves me, a special emphasis was placed on defense.
Once or twice he even got a little excited while watching us.
Yesterday Avram took his team to the the Champions League final.
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