Saturday, 18 May 2013
Kurt-Ritter-Sportplatz in Friedrichshain
Friendly
Rovers B v Rovers C 3-1 (2-0)
Rovers B: Richard – Alberto FdlV, Alejandro, Alexandre, Andrew, Ben, David B, Daniel B, Mike D, Paul D, Pablo, Sam
Rovers C: Robert – Alexis, David dF, George K, Manish, Marian, Martin, Nils, Nirajan, Philipp H, Pranjeet, Rory, Travis
Goals: Pablo – Nirajan 2, George
Match report:
C team put in a great game. A lot of great, sturdy performances by all of our players.
To the B squad’s credit we did falter a bit in the second half and lose focus leading to more chances for the opposition, but in the first half we dominated, especially in the midfield and took advantage of the wet pitch to sneak in 3 quickies early on.
On that note: Midfield was our strong suit. We did most of our work in the middle, creating chances and forcing our turnovers here. Definitely need to work on the defensive line and the offense as well.
But overall way to go everyone. Fantastic work. Gives me hope for our 11-a-side debut next season.
Til then. (Travis)



Saturday, 18 May 2013
Kurt-Ritter-Sportplatz in Friedrichshain
FZ-Bezirksliga
Rovers v SC International Berlin 3-3 (2-0)
Rovers: Guillaume – Andreas (Gilly 60), Rick, Denis – Tommaso (Calvin 60), Federico (c), Christian – Rune (Karim 60), Rafa – Niels, David G
Goals: Niels 3
Booked: Gilly and 1 opponent



Monday, 13 May 2013, 7.45 pm
FZ-Kreisliga A
SV Süden 09 FZL v Rovers 1-1 (1-0)
Rovers: Richard – Alex D, Alexandre, Arthur, Daniel B, David B, David G, Eric, Fredrik, George, Mark, Mike L, Philipp, Sam
Goal: David G
Match report:
The first half was probably the worst football I’ve seen from the Rovers. We weren’t paying attention, we weren’t confident on the ball, and we had zero motivation.
After 25 minutes of volleyball, the ref gave Süden a freekick and they fed the ball out to the wide open player at the top of the box and to our amazement, he put in a great shot that hit off the bottom of the crossbar and went in. Richard didn’t have a chance and our players didn’t even know what was going on…
At half-time, we made some changes. Arthur & Daniel came into the mix, shortly followed by Philipp. We started playing better as a team, but still garbage. The ref decided that he was no longer going to call fouls for both teams and wanted to give his buddies a better chance. Alex D heads the ball in, but the ref calls off our goal, which was clearly over the line when their player knocked it out. Then we get another corner 5 seconds later and this time David G made sure he headed it into the back of the net. Rovers equalize.
Now at this point of the game, I still had an ounce of respect for the referee, but it was about to go downhill, very fast. Mike L goes to retrieve the ball from the opponent’s net and he gets kicked from behind out of frustration and the ref just stands there and does nothing. The remaining 25 minutes everything went their way. 50/50 ball, foul on us. we’re first to the ball, foul on us. They kick us, foul on us. It was like watching “remember the titans” when they played with that racist ref ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8vXroMMGdM ). And it was just as we were gaining momentum after the goal. And he’s laughing it up with his buddies (including their trainer) on the sideline. Jokes on them. They are stuck in this garbage league and we’re getting out.
That wasn’t football. That was kicking the ball in the air while our opponents kicked us from behind. A disgrace of a game. The referee should be ashamed of himself and so should their players. Just because they have no chance of winning the league, doesn’t mean they should try to injure us.
Things we need to work on:
Calm down in the beginning of the match and knock the ball around like we know we can.
Motivate each other and pay attention to our roles on defence.
Don’t get into a discussion with our opponents.
And most importantly: play OUR game, not theirs.
Quotes:
“It was the combination of the worst pitch against the worst team.” – Eric
“At least TRY to be fair, ref.” – Mike D
I was channeling Lothar Mattäus at the end of the game.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YZLdoTHCIE (Mike)



Monday, 13 May 2013
Buchhorster Str. in Pankow
Fz-Landesliga KF
VfB Einheit zu Pankow FZ v Rovers A7 5-5 (2-2)
Rovers: James K – Adam, Andrew, Ben, Alexis, David dF, John, Nils, Michele, Steven
Goals: own goal, Ben, Adam 2, Andy
Match report:
VFB Einheit zu Pankow are a team with a plan, and they stick to it. They like to keep 4 players in defence, 1 in midfield, and 1 gigantic bloody striker up front, and then play the long ball. You would think this wouldn’t provide many scoring opportunities for them, but it seems to work.
These guys were a big, physical team, and their striker caused problems for our defence time and time again, with his holding ability and his speed. They used this tactic to get the better of us a number of times…. but the Rovers also have a plan. We like to play fast paced passing football, and we like to score. Unfortunately we didn’t do much of that in the first half! It was probably the slowest half of football i have ever seen. We pressed up the pitch, but didn’t take our chances. The deadlock was broken after 20 minutes, when a fierce low shot from myself (John) was saved by the keeper (who was superb to be fair), but rebounded in off the defender. The dubious goals committee have ruled this as an own goal, but i’m taking the assist. VFB Einheit answered within minutes when they broke from midfield and scored a screamer from 30yards. The game was on. We continued to attack but were caught out by the speed of the VFB Einheit striker who made it 2 – 1. We needed to get back in the game, and after some brilliant forward play, Ben fired a low shot in to the corner! We’re back in this!
It was 2 – 2 at half time, so we decided to press more, and go for the win, but this also looked like it could be our downfall.
VFB Einheit played clever counter attack football, and the big striker managed to notch time and time again. Although we were making a number of goal scoring opportunities, we were down 5 – 2, with 20minutes to go.
Nils, wearing the captains armband, must have run 20 miles, because he was everywhere, commanding midfield and pushing us forward. The one word to sum up the last 20 minutes was determination! We knew we could get something from this game, and we were going to fight for it. Time for all out attack. We changed to 1 defender, 3 midfielders and 2 strikers, and piled forward! 15 minutes to go, Andy tears in to the box and slots one home. 10 minutes to go, some slick passing and a scramble in the box and Adam has put his name on the scoreboard. 5 minutes to go, some individual brilliane from Adam, who remarked “its like no one has seen a step over in this country” brings us level at 5 a peice. We tried to up the tempo and go for the win, but the referree had to go home for his dinner, so he called it. The fight we showed in latter stages of the second half was tremendous, and if we bring that into the last 4 games of the season, I see us taking 12 points.
Thanks to Ben and Andy for coming down and helping us out. (John)



Sunday, 5 May 2013
Kurt-Ritter-Sportplatz in Friedrichshain
Fz-Landesliga KF
Rovers A7 v Living Legends Berlin II 2-5 (1-4)
Rovers: Adam – Alex W, Alexis, David dF, Edouard, John, Martin, Nils, Ryu, Travis
Goals: Travis, John
Match report:
Man another tough loss for the Rovers despite maybe our best overall team performance to date. We getting there.
First half. After realizing that we tend to give up at least 1 or two goals in the first 10-15 minutes of every match we discussed focusing on gaining confidence and rhythm during this time and we did that very well, we played with confidence through the first 15 minutes or so until a sloppy error cost us a goal which sort of let the floodgates open for a quick string of goals and despite a late, unlikely header goal by Travis we couldn’t regain momentum.
Second half we showed more fire but with only 2 subs also began to show signs of fatigue (though I have to say we are much much fitter than a month ago and we faired well against a team with a full side of subs—is there a limit to how many you can bring to a match? They had 14 guys!). A late, well-earned, precision shot by John gave us some renewed hope but just not enough time left to capitalize.
Living Legends were not as impressive as their position on the ladder would dictate. They were not fitter or faster than us (quite the opposite), and they were not more skilled than us as individual players. But they had a very good team sense: always checking back, always leaving the man with the ball 2+ good options.
If we had been more consistent in our tracking on defense (to their credit they excelled at losing our defenders with a lot of criss crossing on the attack) and had taken more chances (our shot # was amazingly low yesterday) we could have stayed with them.
So we work on next : zone defense + offensive chances/shooting under pressure.