Boys Soccer defeats Saratoga High School 1-0
The Matadors maintain their second-half lead throughout the game
Senior Ryan Tan guards his SHS opponent. Photo by Stephanie Zhang
February 7, 2023
Varsity Boys Soccer defeated Saratoga High School 1-0 on Thursday, Feb. 2, bringing its league score to 3-4-2 and overall score to 7-7-3. After a scoreless first half, sophomore Royce Tse managed to break the tie with a clean left-footed shot into the bottom right corner of the goal. Despite scoring, Tse believes that he still needs to improve in order to further help his team in future games.
“I definitely could have pushed myself a little bit more to really fight for every 50/50 [ball] and just sacrifice a little bit more for the team,” Tse said. “But I think overall as a team, we did a really good job of scrapping it out and just playing it out to the last minute.”
Tse attributes the teams’ turnaround going into the second half to the captains’ speeches during halftime. He says they brought new energy to the team, which led to the goal.
“[Our] team captain [Guruprasad Gopinath] was really good at just giving speeches; he’s very down to earth and it’s very honest and straightforward,” Tse said. “Once you’re honest and you face what problems you have and what you can improve on, it gives you motivation to change.”
While MVHS won the game, sophomore Spandan Dutta notes that the team still has room for improvement. As a center-back, Dutta believes they should work to maintain more possession in the defensive third. He also mentions there were a lot of missed opportunities and the goal tally for MVHS should have been a lot higher.
“As a team, we should try to have more possession through the back and we need to finish our goal scoring opportunities,” Dutta said. “Overall, we played a great game, but hopefully, going forward, we can capitalize on the opportunities we created for ourselves and win by more [goals].”
