The Yorkton United U14 Fury soccer team recently competed at the A.C.F.C. Summerfest Tournament in Regina during the Canada Day long weekend. This was the U14 Fury's first and only tournament of the summer as previous tournaments and games had been cancelled due to rainy weather and wet fields. The sun was a welcome site during the Summerfest tournament and because high temperatures were expected the U14 Fury called up 5 players from the U12 Chelsea to keep fresh legs on the field.
The first action for the Fury was versus Q.C. United on Friday night. The U14 Fury managed to put 5 goals into the Q.C. net while Yorkton's keeper Tyson Black kept a clean sheet for a shutout. Goal scorers were Zach Kostersky, Jaden Porte, Matthew McKee, Riley McGill and Derek Campbell.
Yorkton's next game came early Saturday morning against the U.C.T. Lightning where again it was scoring by committee for the Fury as they walked away with a 6-1 victory. Goals scorers were Zach Kostersky, Austin Thomas, Matthew McKee, Michael Dobrowolski, and Jaden Porte with 2. Yorkton then faced R.E.U. Santos later Saturday evening and coming away with a 4-2 win. Goal scorers were Teddy Hudye, Derek Campbell and Jaden Porte again with 2. The Fury headed into Sunday mornings game versus the host A.C.F.C. Pumas with a 3 win record and looking for a fourth win and a trip to the finals. For some reason the Summerfest tournament committee decided to lump all eight U14 teams into one giant pool with the top 2 teams making it into the final. The U14 Fury were tied with another team going into Sundays contest but the Pumas where the spoiler as they handed Yorkton a 4-2 defeat. Matthew Mandziuk and Jaden Porte were the goal scorers for Yorkton. The game was close but we just didn't play our best soccer. We just weren't clicking out there and our smaller forwards had trouble with A.C.F.C.'s larger defense. The game was hard fought but in reality we most likely needed a 3-0 win to advance to the final as based on the tournament's point system a 3-0 win was maximum points and with every team in one huge pool it left little room for mistakes.
In all we had a very good tournament. We received goals from a lot of different players which a coach is always happy to see. In professional soccer you see only one or two players scoring consistently for their club so when you can get many people scoring you feel very confident. I was also happy that the U12 players we brought up fit well into the system and showed they are ready to play at an older age group. All but one of those players will be moving up next year so there are signs of good things to come.
-Submitted by Coach Chad Grodzinsk
