Birmingham Living on the Edge Again
When push came to shove Friday for the Birmingham High boys’ soccer team, the Patriots continued their season-long high-wire act, needing penalty kicks to defeat Grant at Birmingham in a City Section first-round playoff game.
Mike Erush pulled Birmingham into a 1-1 tie with six minutes of regulation time remaining, moments after colliding with Grant goalkeeper Jose Cordova.
The Lancers (8-7-8) protested vigorously that Erush should have been called for an obstruction foul, but the game proceeded to 30 minutes of scoreless overtime and a round of penalty kicks which Birmingham won, 3-1. The eighth-seeded Patriots (10-1-4) advance to face Roosevelt on Wednesday at Birmingham.
For much of Friday’s game, Birmingham appeared en route to repeating its performance in the 1997 playoffs, when, seeded seventh, it lost to 26th-seeded Grant, 1-0.
The 25th-seeded Lancers took a 1-0 lead in the 12th minute after being pinned in their own end from the opening whistle. Juan Herrera converted a breakaway with Grant’s first shot.
Birmingham built a 14-6 shot advantage but squandered numerous scoring opportunities--a trend this season. Forwards Jaime Gomez, Juan Luis Herrera and Roman Gorbatkin were completely ineffective.
“They want to dribble all the way into the goal,” Birmingham Coach Jose Freire said of the trio. “They’re not aggressive and hungry enough to shoot from the outside.”
The Patriots finally broke through in the 74th minute on a play that began with Bobby Pouya’s free kick from the left corner. Pouya sent the ball to the far side of the field, where Jonathan Moreno knocked it back to the near post.
Cordova, moving off his line, and Erush, backing toward him, collided next to the post as the ball reached them. With Cordova on the ground, Erush collected the ball and scored from a sharp angle.
“In those kind of games, everyone pushes and it’s whoever gets lucky with the refs,” Freire said with a smile. “We haven’t scored many goals this season and we have to get them somehow.”