After three straight losses, St. Albert’s Impact Men 1 picked-up a much-needed win on the soccer pitch Thursday night with a 3-2 victory over S.S. Lazio.
“We changed a couple of players around because we were starting to lose our focus,” said Impact head coach Dave MacEachran. “We just moved a couple of players into different positions and it seemed to work so that was good.”
The player changes helped the team in the midfield especially, where the Impact have had challenges keeping the ball.
“We brought on Robbie Furlong there and he helped us out a lot there,” said St. Albert winger Mark McQuaid. “He got stuck in the middle of the park for us, and just gave us a little bit extra in the midfield, and that helped us a lot.”
The game was scoreless for the first 30 minutes until Lazio put one past Impact goalie Connor MacEachran. St. Albert answered back with a goal from Jeff Bruha.
McQuaid scored St. Albert’s second goal within the first minute when the team busted out of the gate in the second half.
The Impact’s increased energy and focus in the second came courtesy of the team’s head coach and St. Albert Soccer Association head coach Graham Wood who was in the sidelines Thursday night.
“It’s because I yelled at them, and so did Graham, we both yelled at them,” MacEachran says. “They were playing a little bit too passive and we told them to just play hard. They were playing like little kids and that wasn’t what we wanted them to do.”
The pace picked up noticeably after McQuaid’s goal at the start of the half, and so did the rivalry. McQuaid was one of the Impact’s yellow card recipients mixing things up on the pitch. Each team picked-up two yellow cards apiece Thursday night. The trash talking ended with the game, however.
“If that’s not there, it would not be fun, would it?” he said. “It’s alright. Everybody shook hands and left. We just kept the referee busy.”
Lazio managed to tie up the score 2-2, but another netter from McQuaid gave St. Albert the win.
Head coach MacEachran said he hopes the victory gives the team some momentum going forward.
“We’ve lost three games in a row and we need a couple of wins so hopefully this gives us a little bit of momentum to go forward,’ he said. “Lazio is below us in the standings so we have to beat the people below, and that’s sort of what our goal was for the rest of the season.”
