Turning up the juice at the end of the first half, the C Team scored a rapid succession of goals to beat the B Team 4-2 Monday in a men’s soccer league game at Ecole Emilie Tremblay.
“We talked at halftime that we had to pressure them more,” said Victor Levenderos, who was filling in as captain for the C Team in the game.
“We tried to keep the ball more in their end and we created the chances like that — we scored three goals like that.”
After Lars Jessup broke the ice with a goal in the final 10 minutes of the first half, Team C reaped the benefits of its new found momentum in the second, keeping the ball in B Team’s half while swarming their defense.
Two minutes in, Levenderos found the top-left corner of the net to set the score at 2-0. Five minutes later Julianno Rayo added another for C Team, lobbing a shot in from 20 yards out.
Although the shot was stoppable, Team B’s goalkeeper was unable to get in the ball’s way.
“I’m not even supposed to be playing, I’m hurt,” said Derric Lewis, captain of the B Team who was filling in as goalkeeper. “The reason why I’m playing goal is it (requires) the least mobility. If the ball is coming towards the net and I can get close to it good; if it’s going beyond me, I just accept it. Hopefully the team accepts it.
“In the second half they made a little adjustment that we did not adjust to quick enough and they hit us,” said Lewis. “It was a neat game, that’s for sure. It was well matched.”
Twelve minutes into the second B Team cracked C Team’s shutout-play, scoring to make it 3-1. B Team’s Jeff Hills bowled in a soft shot into the bottom right corner after some pinball action in front of C Team’s net.
Suffering from a knee injury, Rayo left the game after scoring his second goal 12 minutes into the second half to make it 4-1. Rayo’s absence on the field seems to have altered the game’s chemistry. Showing some life in the middle of the second half, the B Team produced a bevy of scoring opportunities. Twice in ten minutes C Team’s keeper faced a barrage of quick shots from short range, the second of which forced him to make back-to-back diving saves.
“The keeper saved the game for us,” said Levenderos of goalkeeper Chris Harwood. “He was phenomenal. Without Chris we wouldn’t have won the game.”
Ironically Harwood is not Team C’s regular keeper.
“He used to play (in net) a long time ago when he was a junior,” explained Levenderos. “George (Maratos) is injured. George is usually our keeper.”
Hills scored his second goal to cap the game’s scoring, with 12 minutes left.