Valley Sports ReportATHENS — Galeton scored the game's only goal on a penalty kick midway through the second half, and made it stand up for a 1-0 win over Athens here Saturday in NTL boys soccer action at Alumni Stadium.
"Our play simply wasn’t good enough all around and we have to be better," said Athens coach Travis Reynard. "Our touches, our passes, our decisions all need to be cleaned up.
"After getting scored on, we shut down and panicked and tried doing our own thing rather than continuing to play as a team and execute what we trained.
"Regardless of the many questionable calls, including the penalty kick, we can’t let that stop us from performing like we’ve shown we can do," noted Reynard.
"We can’t let the officials decide the game," he added. "We are talented enough to control a game and have to put ourselves in better situations to win and I take responsibility on making sure that happens."
Athens had a 5-4 edge in shots-on-goal, and a 6-2 advantage in corner kicks.
"Offensively, we lost all creativity," said Reynard. "We lost our ability to move the ball and we missed key chances we should have capitalized on."
Athens senior Zach Fisher recorded three saves in net for the Wildcats.
"Defensively, we did our job," said Reynard. "We held them to limited chances and an unlucky PK was the deciding factor, which sucks because we handled the defensive side of the ball well."
Athens, now 4-1, hosts Liberty Wednesday.
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IN PHOTO 1: Athens senior Zach Fisher. .. PHOTOS COURTESY OF LORRIE GOMBOCZ.
