Fulham vs. Q.P.R.
The Downtown Soccer League 7’s Division fixture list produced an exciting match up between Q.P.R. and Fulham that just happened to be a battle for P.S. 89 playground bragging rights.
The game started at a fast pace with both teams keen to go forward. Fulham’s early forays led by Ayan Sawhney, Julianna Schoenmaker and Andre Dang were met with strong resistance by the Q.P.R. defense of Noah Vaknin, Griffin Picciani, Cate Albright and Alex Picone.
As the game progressed the Q.P.R. midfield play of Alyssa Fernandez, Kylie Ohmi, Lauren Picone and Jack Abrams created openings for Oscar Rachmansky, Toby Barker and Kaitlyn Farah to shoot, but each shot was saved superbly by Fulham M.V.P. goalie Zach Cassell.
Although Fulham’s Gabriel Baltierra, Sam Vaillancourt and Will Landau pressed hard to stem the tide, the wave after wave of Q.P.R. attacks were rewarded with goals from Patrick Baumann(2),Owen Gallagher, Felix Barwick and Alex Secilmis.
At the end of the game snacks were shared and the kids were left with plenty of material for Monday morning playground banter.
Nice vs. Marseille
Marseille and Nice continued their friendly rivalry as they closed out the season of Downtown Soccer League 11’s Division.
Eager to avenge their only loss of last season, Nice shot out of the traps first, with Najee Hall, Kai Glick, William Steere and Kojin Glick contributing to the onslaught.
The midfield prompting of Blake Lackmann, Jake Freidman and Gigi Raskin led to an early goal for young Alex Hall.
That the score stayed at 1-0 until half time was due to a string of saves by Marseille goalkeeper Otis Hatfield and the sterling defensive work of Greta Keating, Alden Cope, Oliver Mettle and Liam Barwick that kept Nice at bay.
In the second half, Marseille sprang to life, as their midfield of Bridget Carey, Nicole Teckchandani and Alex Cretella gradually took control of the game.
The non-stop movement of Theo Simko and Uriah Frederick opened cracks in the Nice defense, that dynamic duo Griffin Cloud Levine and Sam Frere-Holmes gladly exploited,as both scored to put Marseille 2-1 up.
Nice pushed Jonathan Sexton and Rhiannon Hall forward, but their late game efforts were thwarted by the ever dependable defensive work of Hannah Sklover and excellent goal-tending of Alex Hirsch.
The final score was Marseille 2, Nice 1 in a contest that lived up to the soccer adage of it being “a game of two halves.”
