COACH PLEASED WITH VOYAGEURS’ PLAY DURING BUSY WEEK OF ACTION
EDMONTON, LAC LA BICHE & FORT MCMURRAY – "Two out of three ain't bad," Meatloaf famously sang. As far as the head coach of the Portage College Voyageurs Men's Soccer Team is concerned, one out of three ain't bad either. He might even Singh it out loud.
Given how well his team played over three games between Oct. 2 and 6, Macky Singh found lots of positives to build on in the coming weeks, despite picking up three of a possible nine points in the standings.
On Wednesday night in Edmonton, the Voyageurs and the Concordia University of Edmonton Thunder staged a battle royale, with the visitors emerging victorious on a Cody Lawson goal in the 38th minute. The 1-0 score was indicative of the play, with both teams having numerous scoring chances.
"The game was very even. We had a corner that we scored (on) that was disallowed….And then obviously, we scored," said Singh. "But you know, it could've gone either way."
Indeed, with five minutes left in the contest, Concordia was awarded a free kick but hit the post, and the Voyageurs hung on until the final whistle. The contest was a somewhat chippy affair, with aggressive play and hard tackles from both teams. Underlining this, seven yellow cards and one red one handed out over the 90-plus minute match. Despite the win – the Voyageurs' second in three games – Singh was concerned with his players' lack of discipline.
"We definitely have improved in terms of performance wise but there is still the whole discipline thing that's hurting us, and I think we need to clear that up quickly or that's gonna affect our season in terms of getting a few more positive results," he said. "That for me is the biggest focus on the men's side because we can play, we can compete, but where we lack is our lack of controllable discipline basically."
In the rematch four days later in Lac La Biche, the Voyageurs got off to a slow start and found themselves down 1-0 after Carlos Echeverria-Figueroa scored on a penalty kick.
"The first half was poor," said Singh. "We were slow and struggled getting into the game."
The two teams elevated their play in the second half, with Duke Naylor increasing the Thunder lead to 2-0 before Victor Lourenco scored a beauty to bring the home squad to within one. Suddenly, the energy in the stadium increased tenfold and the Voyageurs fed off of the crowd's enthusiasm to generate a few glorious scoring chances.
"When we scored that goal, the energy came up and we got it going so I started gambling to see if we could get the equalizer," said Singh.
Unfortunately for the home squad, the gambling gods were not smiling on the Voyageurs, as Pedro Vieira bent it like Beckham in the 90th minute to seal a 3-1 Concordia win. Despite the loss, their head coach was proud of how his troops battled to the end of the game.
"The fact is we could've easily gone the other way and lost 5-0 at the end of the day so yeah, we're disappointed but how we came back and tried to get a result out of it, I can't complain about that," said Singh.
Less than 24 hours later in Fort McMurray, the Voyageurs played what Singh called their best game of the season against perennial league leaders, the Keyano College Huskies. A slow start proved costly for Portage, as the Huskies roared to a 3-0 lead at half time lead. However, Singh noted his players competed well in the first 45 minutes and then turned it up a notch in the second half, holding Keyano off the scoreboard and generating scoring chances of their won. Despite the loss, the head coach was pleased with how hard his troops competed.
"I was really impressed with the lads today," said Singh, reached on the bus as the team travelled home from Fort McMurray. "Their ability to compete with one of the best teams in the conference and one of the top four or five teams in the country was quite impressive."
Players of the Game
October 2:
- Portage: #23 Cody Lawson
October 5:
- Portage: #13 Max Bazil
October 6:
- Portage: # 2 Enzo Ercotti
