I have had the pleasure to know Luca since he was 5 years old and will miss him dearly. 

He was not only a great team member, he matured in to a great footballer and took control of the left back position.

Of course, being Luca it was never straight forward.. We were playing Broadway United in a game that we were certain to win. Luca`s attention was not on our game, but on another game. Broadways striker ran past him before he could do anything and calmly slotted the ball home. Luca was not too upset, but in fits of laughter! 

In another game against Littleton Juniors, we were 7-0 up. I turned to where Luca should be and he was cart wheeling across the pitch!

We played Crowle Searchers on a very cold winters morning. It was that cold that Luca put his arms in to his shirt to keep warm. Not a bad idea, that was until he had to make a goal saving tackle. Whilst he was running he tried to take his arms out without any success, but still managed to put the tackle in and prevented a certain goal.

Luca had a habit of forgetting to bring stuff to games. This would be anything from wearing the wrong shirt (not the only one!), shin pads, football boots and a bottle of water to name a few. We were playing away at Tewkesbury and warming up for the game. Luca started to get short of breath and realised that he had forgot to bring his inhaler. We couldn't  take any chances so Luca and Joe jumped in the car and set off back home. The game kicked off and we had to shuffle the team around. Tewkesbury had a very strong striker up front, who could hold the ball up and shoot with accuracy from anywhere. In Luca`s absence we tried to mark her out of the game, but no one would go near her because she was a "Girl". Half time and we are losing 3-0, with the "Girl" scoring all three...

Meanwhile, Joe and Luca return and Luca is raring to go (although not to happy that we are 3-0 down). The second half kicked off and Luca marshalled the striker superbly, we won the game 4-3.

Luca has been a pleasure to coach and we will always remember the great times we have shared over the years.