City 4 Callies 2
When Dave McCarthy took over the Red Deer City this season he wasn’t expecting any miracles.
What he wanted was to put together a solid foundation that the Alberta Major Soccer League team could build on and eventually move up in the standings.
That foundation appears to be almost in place. Or at least it appeared that way Saturday afternoon as the City downed the Calgary Callies 4-2 at Great Chief Park.
“At the end of the day the girls have been working so hard all year and they’ve been improving,” said assistant coach Paul Morigeau, who handled the team while McCarthy was with his wife, who was giving birth to a baby boy.
“Even though we’ve been losing we have 16 or 17 girls out to practice and some point all that work was going to pay off and it did today.
“I give all the credit to Dave and the girls who have kept with the program. He kept his standards high and the girls bought in. This is a growing experience and it’s going in the right direction.
“I think in the past, and I see myself in that situation as well, we’d get frustrated and wanted to see immediate results. We’d see a new player come in and immediately put her in the lineup rather than building the foundation and sticking with it and building on it.”
Morigeau feels if the season was starting today the team would be in good shape.
“Finally we showed a system we can feel good about and build on. I think we’ve made every mistake in the book this season and you expect it from 17 year-old defenders. They make every mistake possible as they learn, and when they make a mistake it was in the back of the net.
“But we didn’t make more than one or two of those today and on those our goalie (Lauren Good) came up big.”
The Callies may have had only one good chance in the second half and they were fortunate to score on that when Morena Ianniello’s shot skimmed off Good’s finger tips. hit the cross bar and deflected down.
But by then the City crew had scored four times with Stef Gooding, Amber Regnier, Samantha Vockeroth and Claire Wallace connecting once each. Ianniello scored both Calgary goals.
The win was the second of the season to go with a pair of ties for the Red Deer squad, who moved ahead of Lethbridge in the standings. They face the Calgary Saints in their final league game today in Calgary.
drode@www.reddeeradvocate.com