ESA Compex – Mike Bannard made a huge save on a penalty kick, but it wasn’t enough to send the St. Albert Impact 2 men to provincials.
The Impact wound up on the losing end of a 2-1 score against the Ital-Canadians in the tier II first division provincial playdown qualifier. Ital advances to provincials as the second team out of the Edmonton District Soccer Association.
“They played well, they really did,” Impact coach Dave Bilodeau said of his team. “I’m very happy and proud of them this season. It’s our second loss all season. We just didn’t get many breaks today.”
It was the first save on a penalty kick this year for the 20-year-old Bannard, who will rejoin the Grant MacEwan University Griffins this week for try-outs. At the one-hour mark, Impact defender Vinny Palamarchuk handed the ball in his own 18-yard box, which drew the penalty kick. Bannard was familiar with the kicker, Angelo Sestito, because Sestito coached the Impact keeper at the St. Francis Xavier High School soccer academy.
“I saw him looking at his left, so I thought, ‘Hey, he’s going to go to his right,’” Bannard said. “And he did.”
At that point it was 1-1. In the eighth minute, the Impact got on the board with a great strike from Allan Smith from just inside the midfield circle and it sailed straight over the head of Ital keeper Jeff Kular.
“Allan was one of the guys we tried up front earlier in the season and he couldn’t buy a goal,” Bilodeau said.
In the 17th minute, St. Albert striker Scott DeJong had a chance to put his team up 2-0, but headed the ball just over the net.
Ital was held off the scoresheet for the remainder of the first half even though they held the majority of the possession and scoring chances.
Sean Fraser made a great effort to tie things up in the second half when he put a strike on the net that was saved by Bannard but it deflected right to Ital midfielder Felipe Carvalho and straight into the net.
In the 69th minute, Alex Luty received a yellow card for the Impact for a hard tackle, which sent the Ital player out of the game injured. Fortunately for Ital, which didn’t have any substitutes available on the bench, the injury wasn’t too serious and he was able to return.
A few minutes later, Bannard took a knock on the head after he came out sliding off his line to claim the ball and Sestito’s foot clipped the keeper in the head on his way by. Bannard stayed down for a minute, but was able to remain in the game.
Right around the 90th minute, Ital went up 2-1 on a play that Bilodeau thinks his team might have been on the unfortunate end of a referee’s decision.
“The last goal they scored was a high kick [that looked like a] hand ball when he tried to bring it down and they ended up getting a corner kick off of it,” he said. “That created the opportunity for them.”
Ital was the top team in division 1B at 12-1-1, but lost the crossover playoff with AS Roma, the first-place division 1A team at 9-2-3, by a 2-1 score last week to determine the first Edmonton team at provincials.
Considering it was just the Impact’s first season in division one, they had an impressive campaign in finishing second in the 1A table at 7-1-5. They also scored the second-most goals in the eight-team division with 37 in 13 matches and they gave up a division-low 18. In the semifinal playdowns they knocked off St. Albert Impact 1, the runner-up to Ital in the 1B table at 9-2-3, by a 1-0 margin for the right to play Ital in the must-win match.
“Honestly, we expected to be top two or three,” Bannard said. “We’re a good team. We knew coming up [from division two] people didn’t expect much from us, but we had our own expectations and we lived up to them.”
