GAME ONE MUCH LIKE GAME EIGHT

A DOMINATING PERFORMANCE

After winning last sessions game number eight championship match 8-3, in a dominating performance versus Sinclair & Rush, SSL followed that up with yet another dominating performance in their 11-4 win over a short-handed Freaky Shakra side in the first game of the current session.

To start this late, 10:30 match, SSL, as usual, had its full complement of 10 field players. Freaky did not. Freaky could field only 6 players, & that was reduced to 5 when, later in the first half, the Freaky keeper came up lame with an injured knee, & had to be replaced by another player. Bad for Freaky, good for SSL.

However, the way it started was no indication of the the outcome. In fact, Freaky slugged it out, toe to toe, with SSL in the early going. SSL scored first early. Freaky answered. SSL scored its 2nd. Again, Freaky answered. SSL scored its 3rd & once again, Freaky answered, tying the score @ 3 all. Frustrating. SSL had most of the possession, most of the play & most of the shots, but not the lead. Then it all started to change.

In a flurry of goals from seven different players, lead by Guillermo Cortez with 3, Mike Hogan, who hammered home two improbable rockets, 2 from Jayson Adelsberger & 1 each from David Hipperson, Will Suk, Gianni Pens & Edin Coralic, SSL expanded their lead at the interval to 5-3. Then they exploded the lead to the final score of 11-4, while allowing only a single tally to a tiring Freaky Shakra side in the 2nd half.

After a couple of lackluster sessions & on the heels of some poor performances last session, the win in last sessions championship & the win versus Freaky last Thursday, were the best performances by the SSL side in quite some time. The solid defense, lead by substitute goalie John Kozuscek, playing his first game in place of injured regular, David Shelton, was stellar. Several of the Freaky goals were of the less than spectacular variety, save for one lazer a Freaky forward bombed from the right corner of the box that the keeper had no chance on. Other than those goals of good fortune, the defenders played spectacularly with particular note of the play of Ronnie Rowden, newly inserted on the defensive end from his previous home on the forward line.

Rowden, along with defenders, Casey Walsh, Tony Meadows & the aforementioned Mike Hogan (yes, hard to believe, he actually was playing defense), provided the forwards with all the opportunities they needed. They consistently sent beautiful thru balls to the streaking forwards as well as the occasional perfectly timed long ball that isolated a SSL forward or two on the Freaky defenders.

On the offensive side of the ball, the forwards played one of their better games. They were moving off the ball constantly, making it increasingly more difficult for the Freaky defenders to mark them, consequently, leaving open others to scoop up the SSL defenders passes & set up multiple scoring opportunities, many of which they converted. I wish you could bottle that effort & release it for every game!

So, all in all, it was a solid if not spectacular performance & they'll need to keep that performance on a short leash. Next week, in fact  for the next two weeks, they'll have repeat performances against last sessions championship match opponent, Sinclair & Rush. So, in spite of how well they've played the last couple of weeks, it means nothing if they come out against S&R & lay an egg. As one of the long-time former SSL players always used to say, "you're only as good as your last game, so hurry up & play another game". Hopefully that next game will be as good as the previous two. See you next week. Thanks for reading.

 

	SOCCER ST. LOUIS STATS O-30
	NAME		GAMES	GOALS	ASSISTS	POINTS
	GUILLERMO CORTEZ		1	3	2	8
	DAVID HIPPERSON		1	1	3	5
	JAYSON ADELSBERGER		1	2	0	4
	EDIN CORALIC		1	1	2	4
	MIKE HOGAN		1	2	0	4
	WILL SUK		1	1	2	4
	RONNIE ROWDEN		1	0	2	2
	JOHNNY PENS		1	1	0	2
	JOHN KOZUSCEK		1	0	1	1
	TONY MEADOWS		1	0	0	0
	BERNARD ANIC		0	0	0	0
	CASEY WALSH		1	0	0	0
	SLADAN KURTOVIC		0	0	0	0

Date			Location
Thu 10/8 10:30 PM	W 11-4	at Freaky Shakra(WHITE/BLUE)	Concord, Field 2
Thu 10/15 9:30 PM	50 minutes	at Sinclair & Rush	Concord, Field 1
Thu 10/22 9:35 PM	50 minutes	Sinclair & Rush	Concord, Field 3
Thu 11/5 9:30 PM	50 minutes	Zoom Motors	Concord, Field 1
Thu 11/12 7:05 PM	50 minutes	at Zoom Motors	Concord, Field 3
Thu 11/19 9:30 PM	50 minutes	CD Cobras(BLUE)	Concord, Field 1
Thu 12/3 10:20 PM	50 minutes	Soco Utd (BLUE)	Concord, Field 1