Overall our experience so far in Spain has taught us a lot about the Spanish culture and the difference in the way football is played abroard.
As expected we are all enjoying the weather and the laid back lifestyle that many Spaniards are accustomed to.
We have all taken very well to Spanish food (barring olives) such as tapas, bocaddillas, paella and a spanish stew that was cooked for us by our maid.
Our personal favourite though is the Spanish omelette – a tortilla.
We have not started our spanish lessons yet, although John (Gontier) has organised for us to start within the next few days and we all know it will benefit us a lot when we start learning the language.
Despite not having had any Spanish lessons yet we have all picked up little bits of the language from our team-mates so we have been able to get by.
The house we are living in is very modern and clean and has everything we need as well as a swimming pool for us to relax in before training.
The beach is also within five minutes walking distance. The house is only three bedroomed though so one of our group drew the short straw and had to convert the living room into a bedroom.
John has been very helpful to all of us, looking after us if we need anything and making sure we are all enjoying our stay here in Spain.
The football has been the the main aspect of our time in Spain though. We have seen how differently the Spanish like to play and they are all very shocked at how aggresively the English play.
The training sessions are similar to the ones in England, although there are a few tweaks to what you might expect back home but this is purely down to the team’s style of play, which as you can imagine is based on ball retention and technical skills.
The training sessions are very tiring as they last for a long time and the intensity is very high.
Although training is hard every other day, Fridays are very laid back because of the game at the weekend.
On these days they love to play a game called rondas, which is basically just a circle with one-touch and two players in the middle chasing for the ball.
The downside to everything though has been waiting for our international registrations to come through which means we haven’t yet played any competitive games of football.
This has been very frustrating for all of us as this is the reason we came to Spain to play competitive games of football and improve ourselves as players.
Overall though we are enjoying ourselves but as soon as we can start playing matches I’m sure we will enjoy ourselves even more.
Josh, Connor, Tom & Lewis.
