Courtesy: Vikings Futsal


Duo thrilled by Britain trip

by Patrick Allen

2nd December 2011

BILLY Hayes and Nathan Butterick jumped at the invitation to play for the touring Australian Vikings futsal team in October and spent much of the early part of the year fund-raising for their trip to Britain.

Now, with memories of visiting the hallowed turf at Manchester City, the boys are back and sharing their talents with the local futsal community.

The pair took time out before refereeing a local junior match this week to report back on their recent trip away.

"All the stadiums we played at and visited were outstanding, and that was probably the highlight of the trip," Hayes said.

"We went to games at the home grounds of Manchester City and Stoke City and visited Manchester United and Liverpool's stadiums too.''

For two youngsters obsessed with futsal and football, it's no wonder these sights outweighed Big Ben, Parliament House or the London Eye on the tour highlights reel.

"The best training we got was from the Everton coaches," Butterick said.

"They were really good at showing us different ways of creating space, in addition to improving our skills, like turning on the ball," Butterick said.

Hayes and Butterick joined a contingent of other budding futsal stars on the tour. The boys said most of the other players invited to play on the tour were from Brisbane, a futsal stronghold.

"Futsal is really popular and very strong in Brisbane and Queensland," Butterick said.

"We had a really good group and definitely had plenty of fun travelling around together for three weeks."

The tour was a perfect tune-up for the boys ahead of their bid to win the nationals in Sydney in January with their Northern New South Wales teammates.

"The kids over there were pretty good. Football is their main sport and is almost like a religion over there," Butterick said. "But they had some really top facilities, like their synthetic training surfaces and indoor fields, which were cool to train and play on."

The boys wanted to thank again those who supported them before the trip.

"We couldn't have gone away without the support of everyone who bought chocolates or the pubs and businesses that donated prizes for our raffle," Butterick said.




Posted by Luca Ranocchiari --> luca.ranocchiari@futsalplanet.com