Jeff siblings have Seoul!

A Jeffersonville soccer mad brother and sister revisited the place of their birth and got to meet their heroes thanks to a winning YouTube video.

Brian (14) and Sarah (10) Fischer were adopted as infants from South Korea and realized they had a fantastic opportunity, not only to return there, but also to meet the players of their favorite team, Manchester United, who were on an Asian tour.

They made a short video on their own explaining how they were adopted, wanted to return to Korea and how they have been playing soccer since they were little.

Brian is a freshman at Jeffersonville High School, and plays for Southern Indiana United U16s, while Sarah is a 10th grader at St Anthony's and plays with Net-Surfers U11s.

Their entry was a hit with the judges, and was chosen as one of five winning entries out of about 200 submitted. The contest was sponsored by the City of Seoul as part of an on-going effort to increase tourism there.

The prize was an all-expenses paid trip to Korea to see Manchester United play FC Seoul, and other winners came from England, China, Nepal and Germany.

The day before the game, Brian and Sarah got to participate in a skills clinic with United's junior team coach, and a celebrity exhibition game where they played with and against some United players, including Ji Sung Park, who is also Korean, and Dimitar Berbatov, John O'Shea, Johnny Evans, and Gary Neville.

Others taking part included the Mayor of Seoul, "Rain" (Korea's version of Justin Timberlake, we are told!), and a select Korean team of talented 10-11 year-olds.

"As far as the experience goes, it was amazing, and being able to play with part of Man Utd was amazing too," said Brian. "I myself took several different interviews for the newspapers and tv stations there. It kind of felt like being a celebrity for a day.

"The fact South Korea is mainly mountainous, made for many stairs. Anywhere we went there were tons of stairs or hills we would follow our tour guide on. However whenever we reached the top the view was spectacular and the city was so lighted up at night."

If you want to check out the winning video, log onto: www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7XzXcF6Ba4&feature=PlayList&p=1B9B61D63AD029FA&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=69

Above: Jeffersonville's Brian and Sarah Fischer are pictured with Manchester United coach Mickey Phelan during their trip to South Korea, which they won after submitting a YouTube video.

First week in the books

The first week of the new high school fall soccer season in southern Indiana is in the books and it turned out to be a good one for two of our squads at the Columbus North District 5 round robin tournament.

Both New Albany and Providence's girls' varsity teams chalked up a pair of victories with 15 goals between them. The Bulldogs beat South Dearborn 5-0 and Lawrenceburg 1-0, while the Pioneers comfortably held off Cascade (3-0) and Oldenburg Academy (6-1).

The third of our participants at the tournament, Jeffersonville, lost narrowly in a goalfest to Cascade 5-4, and went down 3-0 to Oldenburg.

We recently featured the new Charlestown girls' program, and it played its first game against Switzerland County Saturday. The Lady Pirates found the opposition tough, losing 6-0, but it's early days at Charlestown and lots of improvement should come with experience.

Over to the boys and another team we featured, Christian Academy of Indiana, got off to 100 per cent start in its two weekend games, with a 3-1 victory over South Ripley, and a 6-1 win against Scottsburg. We told you to look out for striker Andrew Rosenberg, and he followed up his pair in the South Ripley triumph with five against Scottsburg. For the record, Paul DeVore (South Ripley) and Chris Smith (Scottsburg) were the other scores for the Warriors.

CAI will play at unbeaten Jeffersonville (2-0) on Saturday (11 a.m.) in a game not to be missed. The last time the pair met was at the 2008 sectional, when the Red Devils ran out 2-1 winners.

New Albany, with Ben Vigar as new head coach, lost its first game of the season at home to Forest Park 2-0. The Bulldogs' next matchup is against Corydon on Thursday (5.30 p.m.), before heading to the Shelbyville tourney on Saturday.

Pioneers extinguish Jeff at Firefighters' Cup

Providence pipped hosts Jeffersonville to the boys' junior varsity Firefighters' Cup at the weekend.

In the first game of the three team tournament played last Wednesday, the Pioneers beat Butler 3-0 thanks to an Andrew Wimp hat-trick.

The deciding matchup between Providence and Jeffersonville on Saturday was a tight affair, with the game scoreless at the half. However, the deadlock was broken with five minutes remaining when sophomore Grant Vance netted what turned out to be the clincher.

In the final game of the tournament, Butler took a 2-0 lead against Jeffersonville but the Red Devils staged a comeback to run out 4-2 winners, thanks in no small part to a hat -trick by junior Gavin Leavell.



Providence's boys' junior varsity squad celebrates after clinching the Firefighters' Cup at Jeffersonville on Saturday. Photo by Dana Crawley.