El Farolito Wins West Region Title, Heads to National Semifinals
By James Medrano/El Farolito
El Farolito hosted Cruizers FC from Modesto, California in the West Region Final at historic Kezar Stadium in San Francisco, California.
The visiting team started the match with an intense pace in the counter attack, looking for their captain and leading scorer Joseph Mayorca. Cruizers would take the lead in their first attack and shot of the match thanks to an incredible 30-yard strike into the top right corner by Jorge Medina in the 16th minute. The 5-4-1 formation caused a lot of problems for the home side, as they could not combine passes in the final third and were forced to play in the wide areas. In the 35th minute, El Farolito almost equalized when three shots were blocked after a corner kick that was not cleared by the goalkeeper. But El Farolito was able to tie the match before halftime after multiple one-touch combination passes led to a low cross to Dembor Benson.
The second half started exactly how the match started. As fatigue started to play in, the game became more and more physical. The game had a total of 23 fouls, five yellow cards and one red card.
El Farolito took the lead thanks to an Own goal by the visitors in the 67th minute. Dylan Angeles received his first yellow card after he tackled Jesus Martinez outside the box, which gave El Farolito a free kick. A shot from Gabriel Arias was blocked by the wall, but Herlbert Soto took the rebound. His shot was deflected by Jose Ramos’s head, leaving the goalkeeper with no chance.
After going down for the first time in the match, Cruizers began to send more players forward but left spaces in their back line. El Farolito goalkeeper Julian Escobar started a counter attack with a pass to Edgard Kreye who dribbled past Dylan Angeles in open space, but the Cruizers defender pulled him down. This gave him his second yellow card of the match, leaving his team with 10 men in the 75th minute.
It was all El Farolito after that, Herlbert Soto’s cross found Dembor Benson for his second goal of the match in the 82nd minute. Five minutes later, Edgard Kreye put the game away thanks to a beautiful assist by Juan Gallego.
This is El Farolito’s fifth (and fourth consecutive) Golden Gate Conference title in seven seasons in the NPSL. El Farolito will now travel to Grand Rapids, Michigan to face Midwest Region Champion Michigan Rangers FC on Saturday, July 26 in the national semifinals.
“We are extremely proud of the group reaching this stage once again, but we can only celebrate for a bit because there is a lot of work to do,” El Farolito Head Coach Santiago Lopez said. “We are up against a very talented Michigan team, and we hope we can get the win and be able to host the national championship here at Kezar Stadium.”
Photo Credit: Abel Anguiano
