Ella’s Athlete Card

Ella is a 13-year-old midfielder for Riverside FHC with genuinely clean, skilled stick work on her strong side — a nice open-stick dribble and a good forehand. The gap this season has been that she's one-sided and predictable, and good defenders have figured it out. She can't play the reverse stick, so defenders simply force her to her left, where she's stuck; she traps the ball dead at her feet instead of receiving it on the move, which makes her a beat slow to everything; and she reads transition — the switch from defense to attack — late, so she's always catching up to the play. The season's work went straight at those three, and she's becoming a two-sided, quick-thinking midfielder instead of a nice stick with a hole in her game.

• ▸Clean, skilled open-stick work — the dribble and the forehand are genuinely good for her age.
• ▸Competitive and coachable; she'll grind the boring stick reps against a wall.
• ▸A good engine and work rate in the midfield.
• ▸Starting to use her reverse stick, which means defenders can no longer just force her one way.

Ella is working to become a complete, two-sided midfielder instead of a predictable one-sided one. Specifically: a reverse stick she can receive and hit with, so defenders can't force her to her weak side, receiving the ball on the move into space instead of trapping it dead, so she's a step ahead instead of a beat behind, and reading transition earlier so she's ahead of the play in the switch from defense to attack. The stick skills are already there; this season is about the pieces that turn a nice player into one a defense has to respect all over the field.