Friday 15 February, 2019
It was a day chock full of American football experiences but first, let's look at an . . .
. . . Italian Fun Fact
According to UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, over 50% of the world's great works of art are found in Italy.
The United States, under the stewardship of President Trump, opted to pull out of UNESCO as of January 1, 2019. I guess that Making America Great Again includes not supporting education, science and culture.
I should have bought this book when
I had the chance back in California
In the morning, I walked up
the hill from the Villa Skorpion II
to take a look at an interesting chapel
A Pieta in the chapel's yard
The chapel was small and a bit
on the plain side, probably not
a UNESCO World Heritage site
Padre Pio is our son Michael's
favorite saint
And Laurie thinks that OUR house
needs a new roof
I felt that it was time for a cappuccino and a brioche although . . .
. . . this carrot cake was tempting
I stayed with the basics
The small brioche was filled with delicious white chocolate.
In the afternoon, I joined Skorpions Defensive Backs Coach Dario D'Adelfio for my first ever Introduction to American Football school visit of the year.
Although I have done several of these school visits in Sweden and Spain, it would be my initial adventure into the Italian school system.
I took this St. George slaying the Dragon
near the school as a positive omen
We entered this school that caters
solely to immigrant students from
what I could tell
We started outdoors for the first half
of our program with the basics of
throwing and catching an American football
Dario throwing the rock
with pinpoint accuracy
We evolved into passing lines
Here is a young man from Tunisia throwing a tight spiral to young lady from Columbia.
Our group also included students from Brazil, Cuba, Ecuador, Iran, San Salvador, Senegal and Sri Lanka.
I was pleasantly surprised by the relatively high level of skills and the instant involvement by all of the students on hand.
For the last half off today's exercises, we moved into the school's gymnasium.
Three siblings from Columbia
All three had good ball handling and hand-eye coordination skills.
Introducing the basic concept
of Flag Football, i.e.,
how to put on the flags
Our first drill was a form of the old
elementary school game
Capture the Flag
I believe, if memory serves, that
she did indeed capture his flag
More Capture the Flag action
Even their teacher Luca got involved in the game.
Now we started to work on
two-on-two pass route combinations
These routes were far from perfect but they were having fun which was the main point tonight.
Is this curved rebar supposed to be
in these panic doors' release mechanism?
We conclude with a four-on-four game
Each team scored a TD, both on pick-six interceptions.
Italy's newest American football fans
Our lone lefty in the group hails
from Iran and was sporting a Cal State
Sacramento knock-off sweat shirt
Senegal, California, Tunisia
From Columbia, one of her passes
early in the afternoon nearly decapitated me
That led to an in-depth discussion to the group about the importance of a QB and a WR making eye contact before flinging a fastball pass.
We had a great two hour session with these quickly involved young people. We are scheduled to return to this school for the next three Friday afternoons to continue our lessons with these international students.
On the short walk to my C line bus stop for the return home, I spied a couple of unusual sights.
The Veratti Kindergarten
A dragon protecting a home
In the evening, we held our last practice of the week for our Prima Squadra at our alternate, synthetic turf venue.
I was concerned about the turnout for this workout that was re-scheduled on Tuesday as our Board opted to not practice as usual last night due to possible conflicts with Valentines Day date night activities.
These last second practice changes always worry me because people do actually have lives and commitments outside of American football that are hard to change at the last minute.
For example, this particular practice change meant that four of our coaches could not attend tonight's practice.
We still had six of our coaching staff in attendance and surprisingly about 25 players were at the field thirsting for knowledge.
One-on-Ones evolved into . . .
. . . Two-on-Twos . . .
. . . and then into Team work
Although we were missing several key players as I suspected, those in attendance practiced with great passion and made solid individual improvements tonight.
We have only four more practices and a scrimmage next weekend against the two-time defending Italian DI National Champion Milano Seamen before we play our first game of the 2019 Italian DII season.
Overall, . . .
It was a BEAUTIFUL day for
American football!
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