By Maysen Marolda
Staff Writer
Costa freshman Josie Light is kicking her way into Malditas, a women’s national soccer team in the Philippines.
Light began playing soccer at the age of four through the American Youth Soccer Organization, and started playing club at nine years old for the Sand and Surf Soccer Club. She has been playing club ever since and is currently a member of Fram soccer club.
“I enjoy soccer so much and continue to play after so many years because I like the feeling you get when you win the ball from an opposing player,” Light said. “If I get something wrong, I always want to keep practicing until I get it right.”
Light was practicing at a private lesson with her club coach when one of the players from the National Team, Heather Cook, saw her strength and potential and invited her to the Malditas camp to tryout.
“Heather saw me and asked if I wanted to come to the camp to tryout for Malditas, and of course I said I would come, I wasn’t going to pass up an opportunity like that,” Light said.
The tryouts were held in Corona, California, and were from Nov. 19 to Nov. 22. Each day there were two field session. The first session consisted of technical drills and the second consisted of games and scrimmages.
“There were 29 girls trying out in my age group, Girls Under 16, but on the first day I was moved up to Girls Under 19 because they were scrimmaging and the coaches wanted to see me play with the older girls,” Light said.
In addition to field sessions, there were also classroom sessions where members of Malditas talked to the players about what it meant to be a part of the team. The members explained what formation the team played with, and what they hoped to achieve in the future. One such achievement would be getting to the World Cup in 2019.
“Hearing members of the team talk to us and motivate us to work hard to be a part of the team was really inspiring and pushed me to train as hard as I could during the tryout,” Light said.
According to Light, in order to be eligible to be on the team, both she and her mom have to get citizenship in the Philippines. Without citizenship, she will not be considered to be a member of the team.
“When Josie and I did drills together, she always made the right pass or always came to the ball at the right time,” teammate Cammy Keineker said. “She has the passion and tenacity to be the best she can, and was strong coming to the ball in making sure she got the shot off.”
According to Light, there is another camp for tryouts in March, from which the coaches will pick 23 girls for the GU16 team, three of whom have to be goalies. If she were to make the team, she would fly to the Philippines and train for three weeks.
“Playing for a country that is part of your heritage, wearing their flag on your jersey, hearing your country’s national anthem being sung before a game and maybe even crying, makes me want to be a part of this team,” Light said.
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