SCOTLAND YARD NEWS: Alma vs. Kalamazoo
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
Written by: Jason Stanley, Assistant Coach
The reserve squad faced off against Adrian’s reserves last Thursday after the varsity was able to put together a 6-1 victory the night before. Things didn’t go our way the second evening as the Adrian reserves handed us a 4-0 defeat at home. The guys that had played significant minutes the night before went through a light training before watching the second half of the match.
Friday’s training was fairly light again as we prepared to travel to Tri-State on Saturday. We got off to a slow start at Tri-State and continued to struggle on the road as we battled through a full regulation period and two overtimes before settling for a 0-0 draw. There was some obvious disappointment with the tie, but we immediately had to turn our focus to the difficult week ahead of us.
With a strong threat of storms and anticipation high, we hosted Kalamazoo College on Tuesday night in a #1 vs. #2 conference match-up. Kalamazoo got on the board early courtesy of a poor defensive communication on our part. They held onto this lead until the first storm delay with about 17:00 minutes left to play in the first half. Both teams were required to leave the field as we waited out a passing storm front. After about an hour delay, we were able to resume play, remaining on the bad end of a 1-0 deficit through halftime. The game started to intensify as the second half wore on, and we were able to find net off a free kick from Dan Laatz with the help of a Kalamazoo defender. This brought us right back into the game, but a few short minutes later, Kalamazoo was awarded a free kick near midfield and the ensuing service dropped to the floor into a cluster of players and eventually squirted into the back of the net to put Kalamazoo back on top, 2-1.
Storms had been threatening in the distance off to the south for much of the second half, but at 19:00 minutes left, the game was delayed once again for fear of lightning. By rule, once 70 minutes of the match (20:00 remaining on the scoreboard clock) has been completed, the result will stand as a completed game. With darkness becoming an issue, we were becoming hard pressed to get back out onto the field and try to rectify the 2-1 deficit we were facing before the game was counted as complete. We, finally, did take the field at about 7:10 pm to try to complete the remaining 19:00. Kalamazoo found the net courtesy of a penalty kick shortly after resuming play making it 3-1, and the game was officially called with about 8:00 minutes remaining on the clock as lightning was spotted off in the distance.
Needless to say, the entire situation was frustrating for all of us. Soccer is a continuous game predicated on the ebb and flow of the match and the rhythm that both teams are able to establish so any time there are numerous interruptions, the match becomes choppy. I don’t think anyone was happy with how things played out, but we have another important match this Saturday at home against Calvin and have to begin focusing our attention on them. Game time is at 2:00 pm at Scotland Yard.
Posted: Sat, September 29th, 2007 at 8:43AM
