Metea Valley earns draw with Lockport

Josh Robinson's got a problem, but it's a good one, so maybe it's not a dilemma after all.

The Metea Valley coach has a diverse roster in that the Mustangs are young with only five seniors, but they also have 10 juniors and four sophomores. All 19 of them are itching to play, though, so Robinson has the tough task of pacing the sideline and deciding who plays and when and where.

Apparently it's a good problem to have, although none of the Mustangs could deliver the game-winning goal during Wednesday's 0-0 tie against Lockport in Aurora.

"We feel good about all of our guys," Robinson said. "The hardest thing for me is to find time for all of them. (Sophomore) Abraham Antar starts and does really well and then I take him out for a breather and (senior) Ryan Barry suddenly has a tremendous game. Even Joey Donovan goes a hard 60 (minutes) and I take him out for a breather and the other guys do a tremendous job. I'm not complaining, though, because this is a good problem to have."

Metea Valley (2-1-1) probably had the better run of play, especially in the second half with Alfonso Castillo and Evan Lang challenging the Porters best to break open the scoreless game but both being denied by being off target or seeing their shots captured by Lockport goalkeeper Dominic Wistocki.

"When we were combining and moving the ball we had a really strong effort," Robinson said. "We had a really strong effort and I liked our work rate. When we lost the ball we won it back pretty quick. Our mids did a lot of work and our forwards, we've been asking them to make some opportunities for themselves up top, and they did that.

"We won balls up top and were attacking. We were a bit inpatient, but we wanted that goal bad. I'm still really happy with what we're doing and with how well we're organizing and we were sound in back."

A trend that Mustangs senior Ethan Williams has noted in the early going is that his team seems to play better as the minutes accumulate.

"We had a slow start but eventually we started to distribute," he said. "It was mostly from the center backs and getting it to our mids and target players. I thought it went well and got us rolling as the game went on."

Ball movement and possession are wonderful, but the Mustangs are still going to need to find a way of getting that all-important goal or two, especially in tight games.

"I'm proud of our team and our intensity was good," Barry said. "We put in the work and had some good moves but just couldn't put it in the back of the net, but we'll get there."