When four Mountain Top boys participated in a soccer camp in Philadelphia lastsummer, they had no idea it would lead to a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Spain.<\/p>\n
The boys \u2014 Daniel Benyo, Hunter Kruk, Christopher McGeer and Landon Sadowski \u2014participated in a camp run by the Bar\u00e7a Academy, the official academy of FC Barcelona,the most successful soccer team in Spanish history. At these camps held around theworld, a handful of players are selected to train at FC Barcelona\u2019s facilities in Barcelona.<\/p>\n
The Mountain Top youngsters were among those offered the opportunity to travel toBarcelona in March for the 10-day camp which combines advanced Bar\u00e7a Style trainingwith a full immersion in Barcelona\u2019s culture.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was really excited when I found out that I was selected,\u2019 said Kruk. \u201cI never expectedit,\u201d he added. He traveled to Spain with his mom and dad, Ray and Jennifer Kruk, alongwith his teammates and their families.<\/p>\n
The four boys, ages 11 and 12, are involved with Mountain Top Youth Soccer and alsoplay for the MTFC Mayhem team which competes in the Philadelphia area, Marylandand Delaware. Ray Kruk coaches the MTFC Mayhem team along with JJ Iracki.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a great experience,\u201d Hunter Kruk said of the trip. \u201cI learned to play with somenew people. It was cool.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kruk, like Bento, said the Barca style of play is much quicker than they were used to.\u201cThere wee a lot of passing drills and we learned to move the ball around,\u201d Kruk related.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe learned to keep passing the ball around to create holes to help us to score,\u201d Benyosaid. \u201cWe had to adapt to get used to that style of play. We learned skills to helpimprove playing without the ball,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Both boys agreed that the skills they learned at the Barca Camp will help them improvetheir play with Mountain Top FC Mayhem and in the future.<\/p>\n
Besides training, the boys got to tour Barcelona, taste some Spanish foods and playgames in major soccer stadiums in front of large crowds. \u201cIt was a cool experience,\u201dHunter Kruk said of playing in the large stadiums in front of big crowds. He noted thegames were played at night under lights, also a new experience.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was my first time playing in front of such a large crowd,\u201d Benyo related. \u201cI was excitedbut also nervous.\u201d<\/p>\n
The boys and their families also had the opportunity to see a couple professional soccergames including one in which FC Barcelona played in a Champions League game. \u201cIt<\/p>\n
was like a playoff game between the Cowboys and the Eagles,\u201d Ray Kruk commented,\u201cIt was like nothing I\u2019ve ever experienced.\u201d<\/p>\n
His son Hunter agreed. \u201cThe atmosphere was electric,\u201d said the Rice Elementary sixthgrader. \u201cThe fans were crazy. They (FC Barcelona) played a game against a team fromPortugal. The fans were breaking stuff and chanting the entire game. It was worse thanan Eagles game!\u2019<\/p>\n
His teammate Daniel Benyo agreed.\u201d It was such a great atmosphere,\u201d he said the St.Jude School student.<\/p>\n
Benyo noted that the players and their families also got to explore some centuries oldchurches and taste new foods. \u201cThe food was great \u2013 different but excellent,\u201d he offered.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When four Mountain Top boys participated in a soccer camp in Philadelphia lastsummer, they had no idea it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14814,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5312],"tags":[2000,299,10245,4342,104,79],"class_list":{"0":"post-14813","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-spain","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-luzerne-county","11":"tag-pennsylvania","12":"tag-spain","13":"tag-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114327210435895149","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14813"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14813\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14814"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}