Monday, March 29, 2010

Crooks Debut on National Stage

This past weekend, the K Street Crooks competed in the 5th annual Cherry Blossom Soccer Tournament (CBST), held on the National Mall. After 5 months away from the pitch, the Crooks battled their way through 3 grueling matches Saturday, pulling every muscle in their bodies, and posting a shocking 0-3-0 record. What could have caused ‘the pride of Petworth’ to fall three times? How could the ‘Capitol Hill league champs’ not land a single W? Could it have been the 5 months off and no stretching? Doubtful. Or maybe the 2-hour beer run between games 2 and 3? Impossible. El Campo were determined to find the explanation.

Now, it is common knowledge that the CBST is set up “World Cup style” – 32 teams starting in round robin group-play, followed by multiple elimination rounds until a winner is crowned. Beyond the play format though, our formerly-pink-but-now-orange tournament rookies were unaware of just how ‘World Cup style’ this tournament really was. Searching merely for reasons to explain the lopsided results, El Campo's investigation uncovered the wicked truth about the other teams: 23 of the other 31 teams were actually premier national teams headed to the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Under the guise of such kitschy team names as “Hello Kitty!!” (Korea DPR), “Ron Burgundy” (France), “Sparkle Motion” (Spain) and “That’s What She Said” (England), it seems the likes of Ronaldo, Kaka and Messi were just having a bit of a tune-up before the big show in South Africa. An anonymous premier player from team “AC D.C.” (Australia) had this to say: “We’ve got a very busy and stressful pre-World Cup schedule, and the [CBST] just gives us a chance to relax and really do what we love to do – beat the snot out of DC area rec league teams."

So, there you have it. All things reconsidered, the Crooks actually fared quite well at this weekend “rec” tournament and they should be very proud of themselves – they fought some of the most gifted footballers on the planet, and lived to tell the tale.

Stay tuned for updates on the upcoming Spring season, where the Crooks try to dominate yet another DC neighborhood – Dupont Circle!