A Different Perspective on the Game : Soccer: Many of Santa Ana Valley Coach Adnan Bayati’s players put school and jobs before sport.

Half the team often misses practice. Those who do attend usually leave an hour early. Games are not exactly well attended either. Coach Adnan Bayati is often forced to bring up three or four players from the junior varsity to field a team.

And now, three of Bayati’s most dependable players have been ruled ineligible.

Sounds like a last-place team, right?

Not quite. The latest Orange County coaches’ poll had the Santa Ana Valley boys’ soccer team ranked No. 1. And until Wednesday’s loss to El Modena, Valley was undefeated in 13 matches, including three ties. But now, the Falcons are 11-1-4, 1-1-1 in the Century League.

How the Falcons managed to stay undefeated is a tribute to their depth and to Bayati, who has somehow managed to field a cohesive unit despite the poor attendance and loss of players.

Unfortunately for Bayati, he has no one to blame for his plight, and there are no easy solutions.

“School comes first for these kids, work is second and then maybe soccer,” said Bayati, who has been Santa Ana Valley’s soccer coach for 20 years.

Bayati said most of his players work 20 to 30 hours a week to help support their families.

“I understand soccer is the last thing they have to do,” he said. “Most of them are not going to be professional. Helping their family out is more important than soccer.”

Senior defender Oscar Lara works 20 to 30 hours a week at Pic ‘N Save, but somehow he has been able to make every game and all but one practice.

“Coach told me I’m the captain because I’m the most responsible,” he said.

But Lara wonders how long he will be able to keep his title.

“All the hours working and going to school are beginning to wear me down,” he said. “I have two older brothers who don’t work. So besides my dad, I’m the only one working. I have to give all the money I make to my family. It’s a big sacrifice to me, because I love playing soccer.”

Lara is hoping he can continue his soccer career after high school.

“My dad told me I can go to college if I get a scholarship,” he said. “If not, I’ll have to help out the family.”

But Lara concedes the players are not the only ones making sacrifices this season. He credits Bayati for much of the team’s success.

“He’s a good man,” Lara said. “He listens a lot. Other coaches will tell you to quit and forget about playing if you missed the practices we did. But he understands that we have to support our family.”

Bayati said he is used to these kind of headaches, but he doesn’t remember a more trying season than this one.

“We practice sometimes for only 40 minutes,” he said. “Everybody takes off for work and the assistant coaches and I are the only ones left on the field. And usually the ones who do show up for practice are very sleepy. They can barely keep their eyes open because they’ve been working all night (and going to school all day.)”

If anything, Bayati expects the situation to worsen.

“The new grading period is coming soon,” Bayati said. “One guy has already told me he’s in trouble.”

Bayati already has lost starting forward Horacio Granado and starting defender Julian Valentine for the season because of grades, and recently got word that his leading scorer, Francisco Islas, might be ruled ineligible because he’s too old.

Islas, who has scored 11 goals, has missed the last three games while the CIF waits for him to produce a birth certificate proving he is 17 years old. Orange High’s record indicates Islas is 19. If Islas does not produce a legal birth certificate, he will be ruled ineligible and Santa Ana Valley likely will have to forfeit all but one of its victories.

Bayati said the loss of Islas might be too much for his team to overcome.

“Our guys have lost their confidence,” he said. “They looked terrible (Wednesday against El Modena). You could see in their eyes that they don’t have the confidence they had earlier.”

But Bayati said he’s not ready to give up on his team.

“This team has surprised me already,” he said. “Besides the five guys coming back, I didn’t even know who was going to play. I got my goalie (Alphonso Limun) from the basketball team.”

It’s been that kind of year for Santa Ana Valley.

“It’s very disappointing for us,” Lara said. “But we have to keep going.”