By Richard Tedesco
The soccer field that is part of the Five Towns Community Center complex is recognizable by the netted frames of the goals on either end. The bare spots, the divots and the uneven terrain present hazards.
But the boys, ranging from 6 years old to 10 years old, practicing and playing soccer there on Thursday nights don't seem to mind. They brush off scraped knees and play on in their bright blue-and-white jerseys as they are breaking in their soccer skills.
Some of the smaller boys have never played soccer before, and it shows, but so does their enthusiasm, and the attention they pay their coach.
Mario Espinoza, 41, played as a semi-pro goalie during his younger years in his native El Salvador. For the past six years, he's been trying to pass on the fundamentals of the game a volunteer coach for the Five Towns Community Center soccer squads.
"My thing is to teach the kids the basics, how to pass and kick the ball," he said, taking a break from running drills. "The important thing is, they're having fun and they're learning."
He runs a basic two-player drill, passing the ball to one player, who must trap and control the ball, then pass it to the other player. "Stop the ball, control and pass," Espinoza keeps repeating. Stopping usually isn't a problem; controlling the ball and passing it get a little trickier for some of the boys.
There are 20 kids who regularly don their uniforms to run through the drills and play games each week. But Espinoza explains that the turnout is a bit unpredictable, and sometimes twice that number crowd the field for a little fun - and those fundamentals.
As players acquire skills, the 10-year-olds graduate to an intramural league, and they'll eventually have a chance to compete in leagues for 11-year-olds and 13-year-olds, taking long bus trips to play against other hopeful stars in community youth leagues around the county. Espinosa's son's Kasey, 13, and Jeffrey, 11, play on the same team as forward and midfielder, respectively.
The main thing in Mario Espinoza's mind is giving these youngsters the exposure to the world's most popular sport - one that many of their father's played as kids too. "Some kids are playing for the first time. And that's the idea," he says, beaming at the thought of what he is imparting.
It's a slow process. "Okay, guys, everybody grab a ball. I want you to see you throw it up in the air and control it, just control it," Espinoza tells his charges.
Immediately, the field springs to life, with each young boy throwing balls straight up, and trying to stop it with their feet. Some are a bit too energetic about the throwing part of the drill, the balls fly in all directions, with small bodies running pall mall around the grass to retrieve them.
When they start playing, Espinoza first tells them to touch the ball twice, and then pass it, and he has to keep reminding them of that ground rule. "I want you to pass, pass the ball," he repeats, as some of the players lose their focus.
A group of parents watches their sons from the shade of trees on a rise near the field surface. They don't seem to have any trouble maintaining their focus. "It's a good feeling to see the kids playing soccer," said Marco Barvientos who played in his native Guatemala. He's been watching his son, Marcos, learn to play defense for the past three years.
Eight-year-old Elvis Monzon claims he's been playing for 10 years, but he certainly looks like he's logged more than the two years he's been playing at the Five Towns center field. "You can make goals. You can trick somebody," he said, after demonstrating some of those skills in the five-on-five game just completed.
Heleman Paz, age 9, looks intense as he mans the goal in a black goalie jersey that emphasize the black-rimmed glasses he wears. "You have the feeling that you're the most important one out there, especially when you block a goal."
You get the sense that just wearing those jerseys, contributed by Lourdes Berios of Inwood's Imperial Room restaurant, makes all these kids feel a little important, a little like those professional players they watch on TV with their dads every weekend.
But the laughing and the jibes they throw at each other between kicking the ball, and the sheer joy they show running up and down the field, reveal something more significant. For two hours on Thursdays, the unkempt, uncertain turf they run on is transformed into a field of hope in a community that perhaps needs that commodity more than anything else the Five Towns center can provide.
Comments about this story? RTedesco@liherald.com or (516) 569-4000, ext. 204.
