On the cool but sunny Saturday AS Roma played Juventus for the second time this season beating them 3-1 in a Downtown Soccer League game. Roma was down five of their original players, and had since added Samantha Sewell to the roster. Juventus was missing coach Sam Clayton and son Liam, as well as Brody Sharoff.
It still made for an exciting game, with a lot of passing and a hat trick for Roma’s James Carney. The first goal for Roma came when Tyler Rohan threw in from the side to Anthony Miguez, who passed it to Nicky Leong.
Juventus fought for the rest of the first half, with strong defensive blocks and scoring attempts by Deejai Riangkrul and Wyatt Accardi. The play continued up and down the Battery Park City field, until Roma’s Elias Griffin was fouled. His shot on goal was blocked by a strong defensive core, including Callie Aboaf and Miles Koerner.
Juventus’ goalie, Milo Bernfield-Millman, made several nice saves, including two high boots from Griffin. Accardi continued to put pressure on Roma, but Sewell in goal covered the ball for a nice save. Elan Halpern made a fine pass to Riangkrul who had a good foot but was unable to beat Roma’s defense, including Katie Higgins, who persevered and kicked the ball several times, but was blocked by Athena Karavasilis. Just before the whistle blew for half time, Griffin snuck behind the Juventus goalie and scored.
Griffin didn’t see much action in the goal in the second half for Roma, and waited calmly on the grass. Sewell proved to be as aggressive on field as in the goal, and tackled Juventus players attempting to score on Griffin. Inadvertently, she took down Roma’s Luke Marable as well. She made up for it later with a nice pass to Marable, whose shot on goal was wide. James Carney rocketed a ball past Jonah Weinstein in the Juventus goal, for his first of three goals. His next shot on goal was blocked by Gianna LaGreca. Karavasilis had another solid kick, and Advay Sriram also hustled to the ball, but neither could connect for Juventus. Rohan continued to demonstrate his newly-learned cutback skill, but was foiled in scoring attempts.
Soon after, Leong threw in the ball from the side to Carney, who dribbled, kicked the ball past the Juventus defense, then angled it in for his second goal. Sewell followed that up with a big smile, when she scored soon after. Nicole LaGreca continued to sub enthusiastically for Juventus, but despite the positive attitude on the Juventus team, they were unable to score. Jonah Weinstein made a nice save on a Gabriel Colon shot on goal, but the save of the season goes to Accardi, whose diagonal blast and subsequent nose dive to the ground prevented another Roma goal.
