Powell River Villa lost 4-3 to Bays United (Victoria) at Timberlane Park on Saturday, October 15, in a Vancouver Island Soccer League (VISL) game that saw both teams struggling with player absences.
“Bays United came to Powell River with 10 players, but we only had 11 players able to attend this past weekend,” said Tony Leach, Villa’s coach. “We had a couple of defensive lapses that allowed their players to get past us and have chances to score, and they were able to capitalize on those chances.”
Bays opened the scoring at eight minutes in the first half. Villa answered at 29 minutes off a penalty kick by Griffin Leach, who sprang on the rebound to beat the Bays keeper and tie the game going into halftime. Bays was quick off the mark in the second half, scoring at 48 minutes to take the lead.
“In the last two games, we’ve given up goals at the beginning of the second half, and those mostly come from our mistakes, which is the frustrating part,” said Chris McDonough, Villa’s manager. “This was actually our second-highest scoring game of the season, so on the production side we did well, but we gave up goals, too, and you can’t do that at this level and achieve results.”
Brody Harry tied the game again at 50 minutes, then Bays scored twice in quick succession, at 73 minutes and then off a penalty kick at 75 minutes. Villa pushed the play in the last 10 minutes, with Jake Kenmuir scoring at 87 minutes. Despite best efforts, Villa was unable to get the tying goal before the end of the game.
“Bays United brought over a good squad and were hard to handle, but it was a good game,” said Nick Van’t Schip, who plays for Villa. “We strung the ball on the backline pretty well, but being shorthanded ourselves, we didn’t have as many options at the top of the park. We still kept our heads high, and had a positive experience on the field.”
Leach and McDonough had high praise for Matt Liknes, who for the second game in a row played up front as a striker rather than as keeper, his usual position.
“Matt exceeded expectations and worked really hard creating chances; he had a couple of excellent headers and a back-heel that almost went into the net,” said McDonough. “Chico [Richard Murphy] also played well despite being injured; he answered the call for us when he probably shouldn’t have played. Brody scored his first goal of the season, and Jarek [Long] put in a full 90 minutes of hard work for us.”
Villa heads to the island this weekend to face Nanaimo FC on Saturday, October 22.
“Nanaimo is only three points ahead of us in the standings, so a win is absolutely possible if we come with a willingness to play and work hard for each other, and get back to that team mentality,” said Leach. “We’ve lost eight important points at home in this first half of the season, and now we have to take points off some of the top teams in the league to stay out of relegation. It’s not where I hoped to be at this point, but we can do it if we play the way I know we can.”
Villa returns home to Timberlane on October 29 to host Victoria Highlanders FC. Kickoff is at 1:30 pm, and tickets will be available at the gate.
