Navy midfielders Julie Reynolds and Christine Calderon get the ball from a U.D. Mairena player during a scrimmage in Seville, Spain. (Courtesy of U.S. Navy / Paul Cage)
Navy midfielders Julie Reynolds and Christine Calderon get the ball from a U.D. Mairena player during a scrimmage in Seville, Spain. (Courtesy of U.S. Navy / Paul Cage)
Navy midfielder CiAnna Weikle kicks the ball downfield during a scrimmage against U.D. Mairena in Seville, Spain, on Monday. The Navy Women’s Soccer Team is playing in Europe during the Naval Academy’s spring break. Mairena won the match with a 3-2 victory over Navy. (Courtesy of U.S. Navy / Paul Cage)
The Spanish soccer girls were faster, feistier, fitter — and in the end, claimed victory during a scrimmage with women’s soccer players visiting Rota, Spain, from the U.S. Naval Academy.
Every four years, the academy’s women’s soccer program takes the team on a “spring break” tour out of the States to a spot on the globe housing a U.S. Navy base. The reason for the trip is to boost cultural awareness, sprinkled, maybe, with a bit of humility.
Monday’s scrimmage between a women’s community soccer team from the Spanish city of Seville “was a lot quicker paced, a faster game and more physical, like a lot more fouls and falling,” said Kari Weniger, the academy’s team captain. “It was a different way of playing for us, different mentality and … we’ll be taking a lot of things back with us.”
The final tally: 3-2.
“Soccer is a great part of trip, but there’s a bigger reason” for the European vacation, said Weniger, who is majoring in ocean engineering and plans to graduate in May. “We get to see the Navy outside of the Naval Academy. … This has been a really great opportunity for us to see [some] of the world, and from a soccer aspect, play some really good games.”
The 10-day tour for the team of 24 players, a manager, and two coaches — not to mention a lot of parents — has them in southern Spain for this week, then on to Portugal and wrapping up in the United Kingdom, said Lt. Michael Morley, Rota’s spokesman.
A spur-of-the-moment Morale, Welfare and Recreation-sponsored bus took about 25 Rota-based sailors and families to Seville to watch the game. As one player later told Morley, the spectators helped get the players’ adrenaline pumping.
“There’s nothing like 25 loud Americans screaming for your team,” he said.
