Queenston FC 3, Rogue FC 2

All sorts of weather present this week on the Island, as it was raining heavy as I tossed my four quarters at the Grand Island bridge booth guy, but then it changed to windy, to a temperature drop, followed by sunlight and heat.  Queenston wore neon, and dressed 19 players (late scratch from Pat Eadie, which meant we were down a lot of defensive players all of a sudden despite having 86% of our roster there), and Rogue, who wore red, had 16 or 17 guys once Kleckner showed up.

The game was even for maybe the first 5 minutes and then Rogue kinda just perched themselves on our side of the pitch; as they kept pinging long balls side to side between wingers.  Everything though seemed to go through CJ Scirto, who at times is impossible to get the ball from.  Rogue are big and physical, and they were doing well in 1v1 situations, that led to a few really dangerous chances.  While sitting on the bench maybe 10-15 minutes in, we kinda looked around and said, hmmm, this one could get ugly if this keeps up.

Anyway, we did seem to find some success on the counterattack, and Rogue's Kolby Banker (solid player), got called for a wipe out of our Jake Rougeux, which set up Greg Hoffman's long free kick into the box.  The ball landed in the 6 and all 15 Queenston/Rogue players decided to do a rain dance for a bit, just kicking feet wildly at nothing.  Fortunately for us, Erik Kastner got a piece of the ball, facing away from the net and rolled it past Bratos.  1-0 lead probably against the run of play.

It took Rogue maybe 2 minutes to equalize, as we attempted to work the ball out of our midfield, but turned it over to probably Scirto I'd imagine, who immediately found Dan Pulaski who was kept onside thanks to our outside backs who were still trying to work up the pitch after our reclaim of possession moments before.  Pulaski had Netter in no man's land and he slotted it around him, inside of the right post. Probably 5 minutes after this, Kastner received a nice ball from one of our central midfielders off of a counter, took a touch, and picked his spot near the left post...unfortunately for him, it clanked off the post. I'd like to think at this point, for however lucky his first goal was, this one probably should have seen the back of the net.

We countered again probably 7 or 8 minutes before half, when George Todino sprung Troy Brady in, who was fantastic for us all game, and he flew right by their defense and whizzed it past Bratos giving us our 2nd lead of the game.

But, we would hand that back moments later again, this time on a foul which we initially thought was outside the box, the AR seemed to signal it was outside the box, only for the head official to call for a PK without pointing to the spot.  Huh?  It was later confirmed by the AR that he said it was in the box, although we're pretty sure he never signaled nor said that.  However, our own keeper said it was in the box, so all of our arguing in the moment apparently was for nothing.  Evan Walsh takes the PK, and barely beats Netter, who guessed correctly, to Netter's left.  2-2 and we're hoping to see halftime.

The second half was a bit of a different story; no team really outplayed the other, and now that the wind was at our backs, our attacks seemed to have more purpose to them.  About halfway through the second half, we'd regain the lead for a third time, this time thanks in part to a Netter goal kick that was launched over Rogue's flat four back line.  Sims and Suitor were both streaking past the defense at this point, making the same exact parallel run, but the ball fell to Sims, and he took it for about 20-25 yards before patiently picking out his spot and tucking it into the corner.  3-2, and we would play the last 10 minutes or so just clearing the ball away and defending in waves, although in that stretch Alex Bratos made two remarkable saves, one screamer from Brady and then Todino's putback.  Greg Hoffman was forced to leave the game early with a lower body injury, so Suitor moved back to CB.  I think we did well defensively today given their skill and our patchwork players available to get the task done.

Good luck to Rogue.  They'll be in the playoffs.  Equal to the Sharpshooters in terms of best team we have faced this season.

Next up, Clarence (3-2-0) at home