Werder Weekly 2008 - April 25

Photographs from today are in the Werder Weekly slide show

Date

April 25, 2008

Participants

Adam Carlson, Dominic Hutchinson, Simon Hutchinson, Munir Merchant, Wayne Smith

Report

The Werder Weekly returned to its spiritual home in Northridge, and what is becoming the “regular five” were there.

The evening opened with the host, Wayne Smith, overcoming Adam Carlson with a “mercy rule”, 4-0, victory. Carlson described the game as “pretty much one way” with Smith constantly on the attack. Wayne took the lead in the second minute and doubled his lead in the ninth with a mis-hit shot that rolled under Adam’s goalkeeper. Carlson was called on to make two more saves in the half to keep the half time score at 2-0. Wayne increased his lead in the third minute of the second half after Adam had stranded his goalkeeper for the second time. The “killer blow” was delivered in the fifth minute. Smith’s shot was heading towards the far post, but was traveling slowly enough that Carlson managed to get his goalkeeper in the way. He was unfortunate as the ball deflected off the goalkeeper and into the goal.

The other game was a goalless draw as Munir Merchant could not capitalize on having an overwhelming amount of possession against Dominic Hutchinson. Munir had numerous shots on goal but only three were on target, two were saved and the other struck the post. The few possessions Dominic had were wasted as he would play the ball up from defense so hard it would go out for a goal kick.

Adam Carlson fared better in his second game, against Simon Hutchinson, than he had in his first. Simon’s offense dominated the first half and this possession was rewarded with a goal in the eighth minute of the first half from a chip shot to the far post. The second half start the same way the first half had gone. Simon doubled his lead in the sixth minute with a goal that was driven in at the near post. As Simon relaxed Adam came more into the game and scored a spectacular goal with just two minutes left in the game. Adam flicked the ball from his defense and the ball came to rest about an inch over the shooting line. Simon’s defensive flicked looked to leave Adam only with a narrow gap that must have just been slightly larger than the width of a base. Adam flicked a figure from six inches away that made it through the narrow gap, struck the ball and lifted it into the top corner of the goal. Simon attacked in numbers for the last couple of minutes and Carlson managed to wait out the remaining time behind his massed defense.

Munir Merchant dominated the first few minutes of his game against Wayne Smith. Merchant kept possession from the kick off, and when Smith won the ball he was only able to knock it out of his shooting zone. Wayne’s first shot on goal, in the third minute, was against the run of play. Unfortunately for Munir the ball took a slight deflection off a defender, which was enough to deflect the ball past the goalkeeper and into the goal. Merchant managed to hold Smith to this one goal until there was just 33 seconds left in the first half. Wayne’s shot hit Munir’s goalkeeper, the ball popped up into the air, when it dropped down it struck the back of the goalkeeper’s arms and bounced into the goal. The second half was played in Merchant’s half as Smith attacked in waves. Munir did make three really good saves with his goalkeeper, but it was only a question of time until Wayne scored his third. Smith pushed the ball into Merchant’s shooting zone and the ball stopped just in the right spot with two attackers aligned for the shot. When the shot came the ball went over the goalkeeper into the top of the netting. “It was my prettiest goal of the night,” Smith said after the game.

It is an oft used quote “a game of two halves”, but the game between Adam Carlson and Dominic Hutchinson would prove it to be an accurate description of their game. Dominic decided not to play with his glove for this game, and he described his performance in the first half as “poor”. Adam had most of the possession and scored his first goal in the fifth minute, and doubled his lead in the in the eleventh minute. Dominic struck back in less than a minute to make the half time score 2-1 to Adam. At half time Dominic replaced his Sports Figure goalkeeper with a metal one, as he said that his Sports Figure goalkeeper had moved on the rod when struck by the ball for both of Carlson’s goal. The new goalkeeper made a difference as Dominic saved a number of Adam’s shots. In the fifth minute Dominic equalized, and start to have the lion’s share of possession. This was rewarded in the ninth minute when he scored the winning goal to cap his remarkable come back.

The game between Wayne Smith and Simon Hutchinson was a game where there were very few shots on goal. Smith only had two shots and scored from both of them. The first came in the fifth minute from a ramp shot off a defending figure which deflect high, over the goalkeeper, and into the top of the goal. The second came at the same time in the second half and from an identical shot, ramped off a defender into the top of the goal. After the second goal Simon did have a period of possessions but he struggled to get past Wayne’s nine figure defense. Although he did not score Simon did have two shots on goal, one in each half, which were saved by Smith’s goalkeeper.

The final game of the night was between Munir Merchant and Adam Carlson. Munir enjoyed most of the possession during the game. He made over 20 shots of goal, most of which were wide of the goal, two hit Carlson’s goalpost, and two were saved by Adam’s goalkeeper. With seconds left in the first half Munir did get one shot on goal on target as he scored the only goal of the game. Merchant pushed the ball through Carlson’s defense and scored with quick shot at the near post, which took Adam by surprise. Carlson did attack more in the second half but failed to keep possession for any time and he resorted to flicking the ball from his defense to his heavily outnumbered strikers on Munir’s shooting line.

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