Nations...United

For the better part of the past two months I have been involved daily with the coaching of our school's senior boy's soccer team. It was a whirlwind of activity and a greatly enjoyable experience to be working with these students on a daily basis. Having facilities that would be the envy of many professional clubs and university programs, Ridley College is well-equipped to be a leading program in Canadian independent school high school soccer. As an international boarding school we are fortunate enough to attract students from countries all over the globe. While the majority of players are homegrown (the Niagara region of Canada), a good number of players come from other countries. For example, it is not a stretch to describe the following play: Canadian boarding student goalkeeper makes a terrific save and calmly distributes the ball to his centre-half from France. A driven pass to the wing arrives at the feet of a German midfielder. A neat passing sequence between his midfield partners- from Spain and the Bahamas respectively- opens up a scoring opportunity. A Canadian born day student of Polish descent races to goal and neatly squares it across to his trailing American teammate, who drives the ball into the net for the winning goal. The scenario above would be very common in our school team that is a veritable united nations. That does not take into account the variety of indirect nationalities that are no more than a generation removed from the origin of their parents' birth: South Africa, Egypt, Brazil, and Mexico. The team was coached by four men born in Scotland, England, Trinidad, and Canada respectively. That makes for thirteen countries represented in a total squad of 20 coaches and players. Pretty remarkable when you come to think of it. Nations united at a proudly, and uniquely Canadian school.