Soccer reigns supreme: St. Mary’s beats English in City tourney

LYNN – Soccer is back in Lynn as the opening salvo was fired Tuesday night with a girls’ doubleheader at Manning Field.St Mary’s graduated six starters and, according to Coach Jim Foley, “We will rely on Amanda Webster to carry a big part of the load.”The Lady Spartans got off on the right foot, beating English in the Lynn City Tournament opener, 5-2.English is coached by Ed McNeil in his third year as head coach of the Bulldogs. When asked before the game about the team he remrked,”We only have one senior, Capt. Kristi Rebidue. The rest of the team are underclassman and we will start three freshmen tonight.”The game could have been entitled the Amanda Webster show.At the five-minute mark, she set up Brittany Naumann with a perfect cross into the area. Naumann changed direction and put the ball in the low right corner. St. Mary’s jumped into a 1-0 lead and never looked back.At the 20-minute mark Webster did it again as she took a direct kick from 35 yards out and beat English keeper Brittany Goulet to the far top left corner of the net.This made the score, Spartans 2, Bulldogs 0.In the 31st minute St. Mary’s pushed the score to 3-0 on a give and go with Sarah Felton collecting the goal and Amy Bozarjian getting the well-earned assist.With 3 minutes to go in the half, English had its best chance, beating the keeper Megan Brickley only to have sweeper Stephanie Mowry clear the ball off the line. The halftime ended with the score St Mary’s 3, English 0.The second half was only 4 minutes old when Webster did it again. She carried the ball across the top of the area and when the keeper moved with her she put a high shot behind the keeper to make the score 4-0 in favor of the Spartans.At the 47 minute mark English finally got on the board, as an uncovered Devon Robinson took a through pass from Ashley Keighley and had the keeper at her mercy as she tucked the ball in the corner to cut the lead to 4-1.In the 55th minute Amanda Webster collected the hat trick as she redirected a corner kick from Brittany Naumann under a diving English keeper to bring the score to Spartans 5, Bulldogs 1. Megan Forti of English ended the scoring in the 65th minute as she blasted a kick into the top left corner that the Spartan keeper had no chance at. With 3 minutes to go Brittany Neumann was taken down in the area and a penalty kick was called. Naumann took the shot only to have English keeper, Brittany Goulet make a brilliant diving save to her left. The game ended with St Mary’s winning, 5-2 and the Spartans will play in the Championship game Saturday at 5:00 PM.St Mary’s first league game is next Wednesday at Cardinal Spellman. English will play Saturday in the consolation game at Manning Field at 1:00 PM. English will play its first NEC game Thursday at Manning Field against Salem.