Team Confidence

To go from being the top player to one of the weak players is a huge shot to the ego.  I realize I'm a girl and I'm not the top player on my men's team, but I play pretty sporty and it hurt my little heart that I didn't play at first in my Monday night league playoffs.

When I was finally put in, I was SO excited!  And we won decisively :)

I was sat the first round the next day and was ok with that.  One of our teammates (BB) told me that in the final few matches of the tournament, all the top players should play - this isn't the time to be "fair" and play everyone.  I wholeheartedly agree.

Ironically, BB would sit out the the whole day Sunday and only played one match on Saturday.

Anyway, my captain puts me in in our second match on Sunday.

I'm like, really?

I was shocked.  But when he didn't put in my boyfriend, also, and instead played me, I was confused.  Put me in, ok, but don't take him out!

I win 2, lose 2.  If I would have kicked in 2 balls, I would be a 4-0 girl :)  They sat out another teammate in the 2nd round, and me in the 4th.  I felt pretty good.  :)  One guy didn't get to play at all on Sunday and I lasted longer than another, lol.  Must kill their egos.

As I am sitting there thinking about my missed kick, I overhear BB say to our captain. "we should be playing all our top players right now."

I got real upset.

As I said, I agreed with that of course, but when you say it when I'm still in the game and implying I should be taken out really upset me!  How can I possibly play my best with my own teammates stating out loud I shouldn't be playing?

I confront him and snap at him.  I tell him that he shouldn't say that within ear shots of his OWN teammates, when we are still playing.  Talk about losing confidence!

He apologized but I was still fuming.

And of course, I was taken out.

One of my teammates told me not to let it bother me, that people say things all the time and it doesn't matter.  I tried to hear him, but I couldn't listen because I was upset.


We won that set and during the break he stopped to apologize again; this time more sincerely.  I told him while I definitely agreed with him, he should not ever say that when we are playing.  It just means he has no confidence in us.

He felt real bad about it and all I heard from everyone else was "now you know why we don't like his negativism."  I should have be rude and told him, "at least I got to play more than one match AND on Sunday, unlike you."

But, that's not like me, lol.

(as a reminder, my team won the league playoffs :) )