By Marc Anthony Martinez
East Los Angeles College women’s soccer team tied 1-1 with Glendale Community College in a defensive game on Friday.
The defense kept the Huskies in the game.
They attacked the offender who had the ball and caused turnovers.
Hailey Vargas defended with headers to clear the ball out and stop Glendale from advancing.
Whenever they came to her side, she was ready and made the offense work to try and get past her.
“Hailey’s solid,” Jessica Correll, head coach for the womens team said.
“She’s that type of player, where I can plug her in and have faith in her.”
Correll said Vargas is the type of player that can reach the next level.
She wants to work with the player to get her there.
The Huskies’ only goal came in the first half at the 15 minute mark when Isabella Ramos scored her first goal of the season.
The Huskies had 11 shots on goal with seven of them in the first half of the game.
“We had some chances in the first half that should’ve gone in,” said Correll. Abigail Ruiz, for the Huskies, had six shots in the game that were either blocked or saved by the Glendale goalkeeper and a couple that went wide right.
Aracely Maldonado, Cynthia Curiel and Katherine Flores all had at least one shot that was either wide right, too high or saved by the Glendale goalkeeper.
“We’re getting scoring opportunities. We’re getting in the box. We’re getting there and that is something I would like to highlight for them at the end of the game,” Correll said.
A bad clearance from a corner kick right before the end of the first half led to the Glendale goal that tied the game.
Huskie’s goalkeeper Karen Chen blocked the ball from going into the net but Glendale got the rebound and tried to kick it in.
Husky defenders were there to stop the ball from going in, until Gianna Mor from Glendale finally made it in.
“It was a lucky ball, they didn’t even shoot it. It went off their leg and bounced off,” Chen said.
This was the only goal Chen allowed, as she stopped a penalty kick in the second half to keep the game tied.
“She came up big on a few saves for us. This is not the first time she saves a penalty kick,” Correll said.
Despite having saved six of the seven shots on goal, Chen felt like she could have done better and could have had the shut out.
The team’s defense stopped Glendale’s players from getting into the box.
This frustrated Glendale and led to 11 fouls called against them; Huskies had six fouls.
Glendale’s Elanine Enuga got a yellow card after she committed a foul on a Husky player.
The team has started working better together and their chemistry is really starting to show.
It has a lot to do with the way they played better during this game, and had good passes to set themselves up for better shot selections.
“Our chemistry has been way better, we’re still working on it, but it’s better,” Chen said.
Having time to recover for this game was a big focus for Correll.
She wants the team to keep playing better and work on the mental aspect of the game.
“This group is competitive and competing. I trust them,” Correll said.
She knows that her team can compete with these other teams.
Her focus is to get them ready for each game and have her players recover from injuries.
She wants to make sure they watch the film and break it down.
She also expects to talk about things they need to work on and improve for the future games.
Their next game is at home on Friday at 4 p.m. against Norco College.