It rained off and on during the JV game but the weather conditions improved during the Varsity game. A nice size crowd came out to watch a home NLC matchup. The lights had been on for hours by the time the Varsity kicked off, the lights never came on for one official. But more about that later.
FIRST HALF
An opportunistic start presented the Panthers with several chances in the early minutes of the game. In the very first minute, Connor creates some room near the box but his shot sails over. Noodle receives a pass on the same side of the field only three minutes later and goes past the left Warriors defender but his shot misses to the right side of the goal. Wawasee would get too many opportunities in the first half especially considering their talent level. A couple of corners require either Clay to clear the ball or Kyle to make some good punching clearances to avert disaster. A pass to Noodle in the middle third of the field is cause for some excitement on the bench. Noodle receives the ball on his right shoulder and in true Spanish fashion, turns his body around while the ball goes in the opposite direction on his back. The ball then comes to a magic stop on the left shoulder, it then drops to the ground. Overall, the first half is average at best. Vitor re-starts his US High School career five minutes before the half
HALF TIME
Coach Duerksen switched to a 4-4-2 halfway thru the first half and stays with the more offensive set up for the second half. Sweeper/Statistician Jacob quotes the amount of shots on goal from NW in the first half: "ONE". Obviously that part of the scoresheet needs to change.
SECOND HALF
Four minutes into the second half, Taylor gets a pass on the left side and makes a nice fake move to the inside and goes around the Wawasee defender on the outside while taking the ball to the end line. Taylor then crosses the ball on the ground and back thru the box. The keeper tries to get to it but can not reach the ball, Connor can and executes perfectly for the 1-0 lead! In the 45th, Eddie's corner lands near Josh who shoots but misses. Josh gets the ball in the 53rd and crosses it up in the box and Vitor misses the header. Only three minutes later, Eddie takes a great shot at goal and the keeper barely stops it, the rebound gets to Noodle (or rather, Noodle gets to the ball)but the shot meets the goalie's hand for a corner. NorthWood gets plenty of opportunities for the next 15 minutes or so. In the 74th minute of play, one of Wawasee's players and Josh get tangled up and the Wawasee midfielder punches Josh in the jaw (video proof available). Josh raises his elbow and tells the Wawasee player to "get off of him". The crowd and other Wawasee players start screaming bloody murder and the assistant referee, who is not even watching the play, reacts to the crowd noise and raises his flag. The center ref goes over and listens to what the AR has to say and calls Josh over and presents him with a red card. Considering Josh did not do anything and the AR never saw what happened, it is unfortunate, to say the least, that Josh got "awarded" a red card. A call like that proofs once again that too many officials think the game is about them. It is bad enough that a lot of these officials make bad decisions because they do not understand the rules, the game and the speed of the game -mainly because most of these bad officials have never played the game, by looking at them-. This one would probably be better off judging hot dog eating contests. This AR was the same ref who gave Carter Dyksen a yellow card during the JV game for a 50/50 challenge but told him he would have given him a red card were it not for the fact that he forgot his red card. This expert in incompetence hopefully will not return to NorthWood to arbitrate soccer matches in the future.
Despite the fact that Wawasee players were overheard saying that Josh made no contact with their player, we were unable to get the red card overturned. Josh will have to sit out the Glenn game tomorrow but will probably come back with a vengeance in game 2.
NOTES
The JV lost their game 1-0. They fall to 2-5. The Varsity's record is now 5-2 (1-1 NLC) and the team is riding a three game winning streak going into tomorrow's Argos Invitational. This was also the second shutout in the last three games!
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