A team comprised of players from adidas Timbers Alliance clubs is competing in the FC Bayern Youth Cup. We've asked the kids to chronicle their six-day stay in Germany. Here is the write-up on Day 2.
adidas Timbers Alliance Team in Germany | Day 2: Monday, May 19
By Benjamin Orozco and Kyle Owings
Although the trip started yesterday, today’s portion of the journey did not come short of manifesting any new experiences. It was a beautiful German day, full of football and new experiences. Waking up in a foreign country is a bit of a, well, foreign experience (not to be cliché). Anyhow, at least for me it felt pretty normal because of the fact that I was bombarded by my teammate’s minutes after waking up and am used to waking up in a house of eight.
Getting to breakfast was a bit of a task, however, due to the fact that the bed was comfortable! But the food… well not so much. I was definitely reminded I am not at home, that’s a certainty! Training in the morning was also very “out of the norm.” For us, it ended up serving as a session to just understand how those that follow it go as there were so many surreal circumstances. Training ended with our group being split in two and playing some 5v5 scrimmages against India, China, Thailand and Austria. We look forward to getting the hang of how to deal with these circumstances over the course of the next week.
As we would be interested in what exactly made the training so different, I’m sure you are as well. One key detail that caused the surreal circumstances was the fact that there were players from nine countries who spoke eight different languages training at the same time. These circumstances were also repeated in an afternoon training at the Säbener Strasse (FC Bayern Training Grounds). Touring the shop and taking a gaze at the champions league trophy were also “to-do’s” at the Säbener Strasse in the eyes of all FC Bayern Youth Cup participants.
After returning to the Sportschule Oberhaching, where all the participants do everything but train, we had an interactive course on the fields (yes there are even fields at our dormitories). We competed in games to build interaction between the participating teams that were definitely enjoyable. All FC Bayern Youth Cup participants then proceeded to eat a very delicious dinner. Shortly after, Team USA (your Portland Timbers Alliance’s 10 selected and coaches) held an inter squad ping-pong match that was won by none other than Mike Smith.
Today, also saw a minor injury to Dominic Fewel’s nose in training but the Bayern doctor took a quick look, judged it ok and said just put some ice on it. Thankfully, the injury wasn’t of a serious nature, however it didn’t fail to remind us all of how fortunate we are to be able to be healthy to play the game.
