Orangemen Defeat Turtles in Ultra Fun Pre-Season Match

In the second friendly of the off season the Orangemen gathered with their cross-county rivals the Turtles. The game was played at the wonderful pitch at Poplar Tree Park off Stringfellow Road in Chantilly.  By the 6 pm kickoff the temperature had climbed to 59 degrees and the snow from the massive late winter “Snowquester that wasn’t” had been reduced to a few wet spots on the cinder pathways leading to the field.

At game time both squads were at full strength with the Orangemen posting one of the strongest sides they have fielded all winter.  We began the match with Gene between the sticks, Maurcio and Doug playing our two flat in the back, with each sweeper responsible for their half of the field.  Karl and Gooch starting as left and right back’s respectives, with the winter rested Ben playing central stopper.  In midfield we started with Tedd “the Ogre” on the right, Jan “The Judge and Jury” on the left, with Louis “I can fly the wings off a C-130 but seldom can find the right field” starting in central midfield.  Up top Dave N returned from the west coast and Kendall (who rejoined the Orangemen after stepping away from a few seasons) started the match sporting his newly purchased bright orange Lotto Stadio Primato. He claims his purchase of the orange shoes were to show his commitment to us and in repentance for having joined another team after we welcomed him graciously into our family a few years ago.   By the way if you are interested in a new pair of cleats you should look into these shoes.  Lotto makes a quality soccer shoe and these have kangaroo uppers with shorter cleats for hard ground, but work well on the turf.  Best part about these shoes is that they are $33 bucks.  You can’t by quality kangaroo boots for this price anywhere so here is the link to make the purchase.... Lotto Soccer Boots

We immediately settled into a passing game.  Twenty minutes into the game everybody was talking about how much fun they were having.  The game was fast paced, back and forth, with everybody joining the action and passing passing passing.  One of the best players on the Turtles was they young player controlling the central midfield they call Donovan.  At twenty minutes in, even though he is a minimum 20 years younger than most of us, he was huffing and puffing at the work he need to put in to keep us at bay. Without Donovan, the Orangemen would have posted two or more goals by halftime.

But the Turtles kept coming.  Their defense was strong.  It wasn’t until after the game that I realized, despite our possession and pressure in their third of the field, all of our attacks came from the center of the field.  In fact, I don’t think we had a crossing ball from the deep flank played in that wasn’t a corner or place kick.  Had we broadened the attack we quite possibly would have opened up the field and created even more opportunities.  

As it stood we had opportunities but since they played so well in the center, most of our shots came from distance and were easily handled by their keeper.  Our breakthrough goal came midway through the second half.  Louis collected the ball on the right and made a run across midfield.  Jan made a run from center and Louis saw him make the break.  Louis played a wonderful ball over the top, for a moment it looked like Jan would be able to touch the ball ahead of the central defender.  The defender made it first and then made a fatal error.  Instead of clearing the ball to the side he underestimated Jan’s speed and decided to take another controlling touch.  Jan got a foot in on the left, and was able to pop the ball out to the right.  He then crossed back behind the defender and struck the ball with his right foot with the mere inches of space he created.  The ball arched perfectly toward the top right corner of the net and went in.  The Orangemen were in front.  The Turtles came back at us with everything they could muster and placed pressure on our defenders who continued to come up big when it counted.

In the end the Orange held on for a 1 - nil defeat of the Turtles...and off the pitch the Referee commented that it was the best game he’s ever seen the Orangeman play.  On top of that it was one of the funnest soccer games I've participated in for many moons.  There were smiles all around, even on the Turtles faces.

Three cheers for the Orangemen.  And by the way, I am planning to get back to awarding Orangemen-Man-of-the-Match honors as we move into the spring.  For this game, despite Ben’s triumphant return and Louis’s silky smooth touches in midfield, I am giving match honor’s to Jan who seemed to be everywhere on the pitch at once and worked hard to earn a wonderful goal.

Great job on a well earned off-season victory.  Let’s see if we can turn our fortunes this season!