Fort Lauderdale Burned by Salsa Again : Soccer: For third time this season, Salsa beats Strikers, this time in shootout after 105 scoreless minutes.
FULLERTON — Well, what’s new? For the third time this season, Fort Lauderdale got its fingers caught in the Salsa jar.
It was a long, laborious evening, though, before the Salsa finally prevailed in a 1-0 shootout in front of a small gathering of 2,356 in Titan Stadium.
It finally came down to a shootout when nobody scored during the 15-minute overtime and, with the score knotted at 0-0, Paul Wright converted the Salsa’s first kick in the shootout. It was all they needed as goalkeeper Ian Feuer snuffed out all five of Fort Lauderdale’s opportunities.
Basically, it was business as usual. The fourth-place Salsa (7-3) have made their living on last-place Fort Lauderdale (2-10) this season. The Salsa defeated the Strikers on May 21, 3-2, and again on July 2, 3-2, before struggling to pick up a third victory Saturday.
The big news this time was that the Salsa signed two defenders this week.
The bigger question, though: What about offense?
The goal of soccer, of course, is to score goals. It bears repeating because it is something the Salsa has failed to do for the past 180 minutes of regulation play.
After being shut out at Tampa Bay last weekend, 2-0, the Salsa returned home to find that someone had apparently shrunk the goals there, too.
They got off only one first-half shot and then failed to convert seven second-half shots.
But until lately, offense hasn’t been the Salsa’s concern.
Coach Rildo Menezes, having watched opponents devour the mild Salsa defense until he could no longer tolerate it, went to Northern California for help. Defenders Lawrence Lozzano and Danny Pena--both on loan from the San Francisco Bay Blackhawks--were inserted into the starting lineup on Saturday.
It was the second time in as many weeks that Menezes changed his defensive alignment.
No word yet on plans for the offense next week.
Salsa Notes
The Salsa were scheduled to catch an early morning flight today for a game tonight at Colorado, before returning home to face Tampa Bay at 8:05 Saturday night. They have also scheduled an exhibition with team Chivas on July 18 at 6:05 p.m. . . . Entering Saturday’s game, Paul Wright was tied with Tampa Bay’s Paul Dougherty for the APSL scoring lead. Paulinho is in fourth place among APSL scoring leaders. . . . Fort Lauderdale defender John Clare and Salsa defender Arturo Velazco were each ejected in the first half for arguing with the officials and Salsa forward Salvador Coreas was ejected in overtime. . . . From a story on the 1977 Strikers in this year’s Fort Lauderdale media guide: “In Fort Lauderdale, the Cinderella Strikers were kings--bigger than Elvis. . . .â€
