For those of you who are going, (I'm finishing off my packing now), and arrive in Tampa on 26th December for "The SunBowl" tournament, I will be glad to meet up with friends old and new. I am staying at the Baymount Hotel, 9202 North 30th Street, Tampa, (813 930 6900) so I will look forward to meeting fellow refs there. Looking forward to seeing you tomorrow! Jeff Lancaster, London, England.
Y'all have fun now. We (my husband, son, and I) are talking about going down next year to celebrate Christmas with some relatives in St. Pete. Do you think that the boys can earn enough there to pay for the trip?
Just finishing packing myself. I'll be flying in from Dallas (visited the out-laws this year for Christmas) and I'll aslo be at the Baymont Suites. I feel like I've gained 10 pounds in the last three days...
I know several people here said they were heading down to the tournament. I was there as a spectator. I saw several of the U18 matches in Clearwater. The highlight for me was seeing FIFA referee Ricardo Valenzuela there. He's one of my favorites. He was part of a 3 man crew that rotated through three games, which meant he served as AR on two matches. Certainly no prima donna even though his crew mates were clearly much less experienced. On the whole I'd say the level of officiating was inconsistent, but I suppose that's to be expected in a tournament of this size. There were several Canadians at that particular venue. They seemed to do a pretty good job. I watched a match on Sunday that I knew would be difficult becuase one of the teams involved had gotten away with a lot of intimidating, overly physical play a couple of days earlier and I was anxious to see if there would be a ref assigned who would handle it. A Canadian crew was on that match and I thought the center did a very nice job of letting the players play, but not letting them get away with too much cheap stuff.
I was doing mostly U-17 stuff, although I did have a U-15 center and a U-16 quarterfinal on that Sunday. Pretty good play overall, but something I've noticed at these winter tournaments is a mix of experience levels between the teams; it can be very difficult to control a match where one team plays hard and physical - but doesn't foul too much - and the other team isn't used to that. I had a great time meeting all the other referees, particularly Jeff Lancaster from England, as well as Tony Aslam. Poor Jeff wasn't in the best shape when I called him up at the hotel, due to a late flight and a bit of a bug. Too bad MassRef was down in Sarasota. Now to get the MRI on my right knee...
The center you refer to--I believe--is Alex Rufibach, from Alberta. The Canadians assigned to U18 are from Alberta (with one from BC), are led by FIFA AR Kim Chalmers, and are, by far, one of the best groups of referees I've ever encountered at a youth tournament. They're also a blast to hang out with--we make our plans for Orlando with them every year and about 4 of them visit our Memorial Day tournament in Boston each May.
NH Classic vs. FC Greater Boston. I was AR2 on that one. NH won 3-0 in a pretty good matchup; FCGB moved the ball well, but couldn't do anything up front.
He seemed pretty young, tallish, dark hair and sounded French Canadian to me. The AR1 spent a good deal more time explaining things to the coach than he probably should have in my opinion, but the crew seemed to work together pretty well.
Definitely not Alex, then. The majority of the French-Canadians were down in Sarasota with us doing the U16s, but there were some--who I didn't meet--who were up north in the Tampa area.
Pictures from the tournament Hey all - for those who don't know me, I was the blonde at the registration table! For the rest of you - it was great seeing you - I'm just sorry I didn't get a chance to hang out as much as last year. I promise I'll be able to next time. I took several rolls of pictures from the Radice complex on Friday. If you would like, I could possibly post them here, or send them to you. I will have them on CD when I get them back. Just let me know.
Re: Pictures from the tournament That would be great Lisa and it would be nice to post them on the board. It will give a flavor to people that don't get a chance to attend of what the fields and atmosphere is like at the tournament.
Now "It's Farewell from the SUNBOWL". I arrived back home yesterday from the vacation afterwards, and this is just a quick note to all the people, both new and old, that I met at the event for 2002. As ever, a good tournament, and hopefully look forward to seeing many of you again there this coming December. Too many people to mention individually, but nice to see you all, and if anyone is going back to Tampa at Easter for the "Countryside International Tournament" I will look forward to seeing and meeting people again. If not, then for the "old hands", it will be the USA Cup at Blaine, MN. in July. Thanks to everyone, particularly all the organisers of the event, but I will contact them separately. Take care, one and all, and "keep reffing". Best Wishes, Jeff Lancaster, Lonodn, England.