Racing Hold Open Tryouts
When Nealy Martin attended open tryouts in January 2021, the conditions were worse that they were for today’s session. She offered to shovel snow off the field at last year’s tryouts, just to be able to show what she could do. This year, she was able to attend tryouts as an observer with her place in the team secured. She described the field last year as “straight ice…we were basically ice skating.” Even though the temperatures were far from warm at about 15 F°, the conditions this year were not all that bad. Some of the trialists looked a little cold before taking the field, but the Racing coaches put them through the paces to keep them from worrying too much about the frigid temperatures.
The open tryouts this year will likely not yield as many opportunities as last year’s tryouts did. Racing is much more stable from a roster perspective at this point when compared to last year. However, it isn’t hard to imagine that maybe one or two players might make the squad. At this point in the process, a trialist’s goal is to get that critical invitation to pre-season camp. For Nealy, that is how her journey started. “I just focused on every little detail: what can I do, how can I make this pass better, this touch better, and give myself the best chance of making the team. Then after the trial I went home, and they gave me a call and I am so grateful for that and asked me to come to preseason. The process began then, and I just focused day by day on what I could do and keeping the same mind set: leaving with no regrets.”
As for what Coach Kim Björkegren is looking for in an open tryout, he mentioned that he would be looking for players that bring something “extra” which I took to mean raw talent, and also players that were “useful” which if you look at Racing’s current roster, I think it would be easy to assume that depth in defense and midfield would be useful to the team. Coach Björkegren went on to say that “we are still looking for a couple of players,” and noted that personality and working hard would be considerations. When I asked about how much research he does on players ahead of the tryout process, he said that he gets a little information on the players but likes to get his first impression based on what he observes during the sessions. The evaluation process is a group effort that involves multiple coaches and players have two additional sessions after the first session this morning (one this afternoon and one tomorrow).
I wish the best for all of the trialists that attended the sessions today and maybe Racing can find another gem like Nealy.
