Fresh from their championship in an icebraker tournament in Camrose two weeks ago, Stettler’s U14 2 boys’ soccer team had a spectacular home-turf start to their season on Monday, May 10, pounding visiting Ponoka 9-0 and giving a lot of hope to their coaches for future.
Within just three minutes of the start of the game, Matthew Bennett scored in style with a an almost 30-meter shot, not unlike the ones seen in professional games.
The local boys kept on putting pressure on the visitors for another 10 minutes until Ponoka tried to make a comeback and upset the domination of the field by the host team.
In the effort, they came close to scoring a goal but the referee decided that the score was illegal as it was from a shot after he whistled to stop the game for a foul.
As the game progressed, Stettler boys enhanced their confidence and their control of the field with efficient passing and dribbling.
When the final whistle was blown, there was nine goals scored for the local side and none for the visitors.
Tyler Wells and Matthew Bennett jointly held the lead scorer title for the game with three goals a piece, Tyler Steinwand added two and Cole Bailey sealed the tally with one.
“The team worked hard for a full 80 minutes,” said coach Mitch Finkbeiner.
“The strong play started in our own end, and not just offensively.”
Finkbeiner was happy with the individual efforts, but was even more so with the overall performance.
“I think everyone played as a team and did their jobs effectively, and bought into the team concept, and with a great group of kids like this, we should have a great year ahead of us,” he said.
Next game of the U14 2 team is today, Wednesday, at the Waverly soccer pitch at 7 p.m.