Though the East Hampton Soccer Club couldn’t muster a complement of six field players because of several absences, the five who contested a 7-on-7 league semifinal with Sag Harbor United, the playoffs’ top seed, at East Hampton’s Herrick Park on Aug. 30 acquitted themselves very well in a 4-1 loss.
Wilson Bueno, E.H.S.C.’s backup goalie, was told afterward that if it hadn’t been for him the final score probably would have been 10-1.
In the night’s other semifinal, a hotly contested struggle between F.C. Tuxpan and Liga De Gulag, during which the park’s sprinklers came on and stayed on through most of the first half, Tuxpan, with Alejandro Landeros scoring twice, prevailed 4-3.
Thus Tuxpan and Sag Harbor United were to fight it out in the 7-on-7 men’s soccer league’s final at Herrick Tuesday, a game that was postponed due to rain and is now scheduled for Sept. 13. Gametime will be 7 p.m. The teams split during the regular season, with Tuxpan winning 2-1 on June 21 and S.H.U. winning 3-1 on Aug. 16.
Back to the first of the two semis, Michael Tamay, the Soccer Club’s coach, said that Mark Bako, Sebastian Fuquen, and Esteban Aguilar, the starting goalie, were missing for various reasons that night. Still, the five players who took the field versus S.H.U.’s six – William Solis, Angel Garces, Elmer Ramirez, Gustavo Gutama, and Cristian Ramos – played energetically throughout the fray.
Gabriel Araya put the top seeds on the board a little more than a minute into the game with a free kick beyond the midfield stripe that sailed under the crossbar and into the nets over Bueno’s outstretched hands. The Soccer Club was awarded a penalty kick following a penalty call on S.H.U.’s goalie, Jorge Lopez, midway through the half. William Solis, who faced off against Araya, who had stepped in to man the nets during Lopez’s one-minute ban, blasted it into the upper right corner of the cage.
Soon after, the Soccer Club came close to taking the lead as an S.H.U. defender and Lopez, who had come back into the game, made big saves of E.H.S.C. shots taken from point-blank range. In the half’s final minutes, S.H.U.’s Juan Zuluaga missed an open goal and chipped high and wide before converting the rebound of a shot that Bueno had saved before falling to the ground. Zuluaga’s goal, which came just before the half ended, sent Domingo Perez’s Sag Harbor team into the break up 2-1.
The outmanned Soccer Club could not keep up with the top seeds in the second half. Within the first minute of play, Donald Martinez threaded his way through several defenders on his way to an easy score, and, with 14 and a half minutes left, a booming shot by him that bounced down from the underside of the crossbar was converted by Manuel Ramos, for 4-1, which proved to be the final score.
F.C. Tuxpan, Antonio Chavez’s team, entered its semifinal clash with Liga De Gulag without the services of the league’s top scorer, Cristian Compuzano, but it mattered little as the tall Nieto twins, Jorge, who plays defense, and George, a striker, along with Landeros and Melvin Soler, among others, kept the pressure on.
Tuxpan’s goalie, Wilson Tacuri, made a great save of a 25-yard Esteban Solis free kick about midway through the first half. Soon after, the soccer field’s four sprinklers came on, prompting Leslie Czeladko, the league’s overseer, to call to the Village Police Department, saying that it was the first time it had ever happened.
Told by Czeladko that “they don’t know how to turn them off,” the teams, which had stopped playing while Czeladko made the call, decided to go ahead anyway. When play resumed, Liga’s Michael Montes De Oca, who had been very active, got off two shots, the second sailing just over the crossbar, but it was Tuxpan that broke the ice, as the result of a goal by Romario Arrellano four minutes shy of the break.
But just before halftime Liga De Gulag tied the score at 1-1 when Santiago Solis converted the rebound of a shot that Esteban Solis had taken from in close.
In the early going of the second half – and with the sprinklers finally off – George Nieto mishit a 25-yard free kick that sailed way up into the trees bordering the Stop and Shop market and Esteban Solis, facing an open goal, blew what should have been a sure score for Liga De Gulag. George Nieto atoned for his free kick boner soon after when, with about 15 and a half minutes left on the clock, he put F.C. Tuxpan up 2-1. With about 11 minutes to go, Landeros, on a breakaway, extended the lead to 3-1, after which, with four minutes showing, he capped Tuxpan’s scoring, easily beating Loja, who had come way out of the cage.
Liga De Gulag was to score twice in the final minutes, on goals by Christian Solis and Esteban Solis, but time ran out, resulting, as aforesaid, in a 4-3 win for Tuxpan.