Bethesda Internationals

21 May '05. On a splendid sunny day out at Muldoon's Farm on the lower field #1 which drained well after much rain the night before with the nice grass freshly cut/short, Inter faced its old friends, FCH Premier AC 91W (formerly Midtown Sharks). In the previous 4 matches of league play, Inter had been unable to notch a W (2L & 2T) against this very talented and physical team -- until today. In the first 4-5 minutes of play, both teams moved the ball well against the other, but Inter took control for the remainder of the 1st half, shooting 5 times on goal with 2 corners and 3 fouls, while the Premier could only manage 2 SOG's, 1 CK with 6 fouls. Inter's midfield play was very effective in distributing the ball well on the attacks and Inter's stingy defenders denied the Premier from penetrating and making easy shots for the most part. Nicky marked Torian like glue and limited this very skillful and hard-working/hard-shooting player from making any good runs and few solid shots on goal except for 1-2 that Nat saved. At about the 15 minute mark, Sam received a nice pass on the left side, dribbled up field and crossed a great ball into the goal mouth where Ebo settled, turned and fired in a left-footed shot past the surprised keeper. The Premier stepped up its furious attack in the second half, taking 9 SOG's and 5 CK's with 4 fouls -- but all went wide or high and Nat either beautfilly punched out or grabbled a couple of SOG's/CK's. It looked as if the Premier were going to punch in an equalizer goal sooner or later with so many SOG's/CK's opportunities, but Inter was able to stave off the assault and countered with 4 SOG's, but no corners and 6 fouls. At about the 30 minute mark, Skylar tackled a ball away from a Premier player about midfield and sent a nice pass upfield to Roque on the right about 15-20 yards right of goal, and as a defender came to challenge/tackle the ball from Roque, he crossed the ball through open space in the goal mouth and over to Ebo on the left corner of the goal mouth where he struck the ball past the GK into the left side of the net. Although the Premier kept attacking and sent a couple of hard shots on goal, Inter defenders and Nat stopped or cleared all balls from harm's way today against this excellent team from Virginia.