Season 3 – FOFC Cup III – Group Play – Round 2
Screamin’ Seamen vs. Shadow Dragons
Date: May 21st, 2003
Venue: The Docks (Chicago, IL)
Attendance: 1,245 (30,000)
Weather: Partly cloudy
We’re at home for the 2nd round of FOFC Cup group play this week, and we play host to Astott’s Shadow Dragons today. The Dragons lost a 1-nil heartbreaker at home last week to the North Plainfield Plague, and should be coming to the Windy City hungry for a victory. We’ll be doing our best to make sure they’re sent to bed without any dinner.
The Shadow Dragons appear fond of the box-standard 4-4-2 formation, and have a couple of dangerous players to contend with. Defender Derrick Jordan is an experienced sweeper who is pretty good at keeping the area in front of the keeper clean of opponents, and young winger Devon Berry can send some fine balls into the opponent’s penalty area. We’ll be sure to mark Devon closely whenever he touches the ball.
All in all, though, we should have a talent advantage today, as well as the benefits of playing on our home pitch. We’re expecting a low-scoring (what else?) match, but a victory and three points nonetheless.
Formation: 5-4-1
Starters
Keeper: #13 Darryl Read
Right Wingback: #24 Christian Kvam
Central Defender: #20 Keith Stubbs
Central Defender: #18 Cameron McDonald
Central Defender: #21 Zarpas Lerma
Left Wingback: #17 Mattias Leier
Right Winger: #10 Olav Mauffret
Inner Midfielder: #19 Jerry Smith
Inner Midfielder: #7 Lucian Tere
Left Winger: #25 Paul Peralta
Forward: #11 Johannes Henriksson
Team Captain: #11 Johannes Henriksson
Set Pieces: #11 Johannes Henriksson
Substitutes
-Keeper: #1 Cornelius “Corny” Jernigan
-Defender: #22 Tyler Willard
-Midfielder: #4 Pete “The Old Goat” Tomlin
-Forward: #14 Jesper Gravesen
-Winger: #3 Ben McMahon
We’ve only made one change to our starting lineup this week, and it is a very obvious one. Team captain Johannes Henriksson will be starting for us at forward today. We’re hoping that a couple of weeks as the lone striker for our b-team will act as a change of pace, and help to pull the Swede out of the horrible slump that he is in.
Match Report
PRE-GAME
1245 spectators arrived at The Docks, where weather conditions were pretty good for football.
Screamin' tactics involved an interesting 5-4-1 combination. The following players had been chosen: Read - Kvam , Lerma, Stubbs, Mcdonald, Leier - Mauffret , Tere, Smith, Peralta - Henriksson.
Dragons had chosen a strategic 4-4-2 formation. The following players had been chosen: Snider - Christy, Jordan, Adam, Bernal - Berry, Barnes, Wilcox, Kinney - Wolford, Beltran.
FIRST HALF
Some beautiful plays on the left side of the field resulted in a 15:th minute goal by Olav Mauffret for Screamin', putting them ahead 1 - 0.
Halftime score was 1 - 0. Screamin', bringing the final ball possession rate to 74 percent, dominated the battle.
SECOND HALF
A couple of quick and successful challenges, followed by a shot from just outside the penalty area after 80 minutes might have resulted in another goal for Screamin'. However, Eric Snider made a spectacular save.
The home side´s Johannes Henriksson came close to extending the lead in the 80:th minute. His shot came in off the right hand side but Eric Snider managed saving with a fingernail.
Lamar Beltran of Dragons received a yellow card in the 81st minute for unsportsmanlike behaviour.
Screamin', bringing the final ball possession rate to 87 percent, dominated the battle.
POST-GAME
The most dominating Screamin' player was without a doubt Keith Stubbs. Zarpas Lerma was a disappointment, however.
The most dominating Dragons player was without a doubt Derrick Jordan. Lamar Beltran on the other hand, had a terrible day.
Final Score: Screamin’ Seamen 1, Shadow Dragons 0
Goals
Mauffret – 1
Cards
None
Player Ratings
GK - Read: **
RWB - Kvam: **~
CD – Stubbs: ***
CD – McDonald: **
CD – Lerma: *~
LWB – Leier: ***
RW – Mauffret: **
MF – Smith: **
MF – Tere: **
LW – Peralta: **
FWD – Henriksson: *~
Team Ratings
Screamin’ Seamen
-Midfield: Weak (4)
-Right Defense: Excellent (8)
-Central Defense: Formidable (9)
-Left Defense: Outstanding (10)
-Right Attack: Weak (4)
-Central Attack: Wretched (2)
-Left Attack: Weak (4)
-NSI: 49
Shadow Dragons
-Midfield: Wretched (2)
-Right Defense: Passable (6)
-Central Defense: Excellent (8)
-Left Defense: Passable (6)
-Right Attack: Weak (4)
-Central Attack: Poor (3)
-Left Attack: Weak (4)
-NSI: 37
Comments
An unexpected goal from winger Olav Mauffret early in the match gave us a narrow lead going into halftime. In the second half, our midfield advantage really came into play, and the Shadow Dragons had little opportunity to even things up. Credit has to be given to Dragons’ keeper Eric Snider, who made two fantastic saves in the 80th minute to keep the match close. Unfortunately for him, he would get no goal support from the rest of his team, and the match would end 1-nil.
Johannes Henriksson’s shot in the 80th minute is a good sign, and hopefully is a sign of him coming out of his slump. Of course, we’ve said similar things in past weeks, yet his performance has continued to slip. We’ll be keeping a very close eye on Johannes’ performance in practice in the coming weeks.
FOFC Cup Group F Scores and Standings
-The North Plainfield Plague certainly appear to be the Cinderella story of Group F. The last seed in the group, they’ve earned all six possible points thus far, defeating the Fantastic Flying Froggies, 3-1.
-The Alf Trickers rebounded from their defeat at our hands last week, handing the Manhattan Marauders a 3-1 defeat.
No. Team Seed GF GA Diff. Pts. NSI
1. North Plainfield Plague 6 4 1 +3 6 30
2. Screamin’ Seamen* 1 3 1 +2 6 49
3. Alf Trickers 2 4 3 +1 3 39
4. Fantastic Flying Froggies 3 2 4 -2 1 31
5. Manhattan Marauders 4 2 4 -2 1 38
6. Shadow Dragons 5 0 2 -2 0 37
The North Plainfield Plague grab the top spot this week, by virtue of goal differential. While there is still much soccer to be played, it appears as though our round 4 matchup against the Plague could very well determine who grabs the #1 spot in Group F.
Group F Round 3 Matchups
Fantastic Flying Froggies vs. Screamin’ Seamen
Manhattan Marauders vs. North Plainfield Plague
Alf Trickers vs. Shadow Dragons
Next up for us in group play are the Fantastic Flying Froggies. The players (and myself) are looking forward to this one, as we’ll be travelling to the Sunny South of France. I like to give my players at least one international trip every season, and no one is objecting to the idea of the French Riviera. Many of the guys are hoping there is a topless beach in the neighborhood of Montpelier.
Up Next: We’ve got weekly training and financial updates coming soon. After that, we’ve got our rubber match against the Syracuse Supers in league play. Stay tuned!