Many people refer to Stony Mountain as a hockey town.
But one local resident is making his mark in a different sport – soccer.
Ethan Caners recently attended soccer trials and showcases in Germany. Teams he trained with included Bell-Mendig, Andernach, and FC Nurnberg.
It’s not everyday someone from Stony Mountain heads to Germany for soccer.
“I’m in an agency called E & E (Sports Management),” said Caners, who attended Stonewall Collegiate, earlier this month. “The goal is to place soccer players from universities and colleges from Manitoba. It’s the highest-rated academy in the prairies and I landed a spot on it. The top four from our travel team were invited to Germany to do trials out there from teams in Division 7 to (Division) 2. It’s very high level when it comes to the grand scheme of things.”
Caners travelled with a few teams when he was in Germany. The competition out there was very stiff, he said, even in the lower divisions.
“It was very surreal being on the field, which is like Investors Group, yet it’s nowhere near the level of it,” Caners said. “I feel like soccer out there is way more known than here. That went well and the coaches offered us on the spot after the training. We all impressed very well so after that we went to a higher division team which I believe is the 4th Division.”
That was a different experience for Caners as that team was very competitive, he said.
“Everybody was fighting for a spot there and we had a few players show up and a few not,” Caners said. “Personally, I had a great session and later on that day I got an offer from the coaching but financially it does not make sense for me to go. Everybody was just amazing and they all know English out there which was pretty shocking to me. It was a whole two-hour session, shooting drills, passing drills, overall stamina, stuff like that, so the coaches were really impressed with us.”
Aside from training, Caners had an opportunity to be among 60,000 fans to watch a soccer game.
“That was for the bottom team in the league,” he said, noting that Canadians were very welcomed by the Germans. “It was pretty crazy.”
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