On January 14, St. Mary’s Junior Varsity Soccer team clashed with the American School in Japan’s Junior Varsity soccer team in SMIS. To make up for the previous match–shockingly losing 6-0–SMIS’s JV soccer team has put tremendous work into defending and counter-attacking, all devised by the team’s coach and manager, Mr. Vinall. Arihant (’27), the team’s left-back, said, “We were prepared to pulverize them and show them who’s the king.” The team’s starting lineup was as follows: Yuto (’26), Kaito (’27), Benjamin (’28), Linya (’27), Tyler (’27), Ning Ning (’26), Yuu (’26), Ginta (’27), Yuki (’27), Ko (’28), and Kento (’28).
For the entirety of the match, St. Mary’s boys were in the better atmosphere, connecting sharp passes and having multiple chances. However, the ASIJ was the first to score. The team shortly scored another, making the score 2-0. However, as the first half came to a near end, Linya (’27)kicked from the left, scoring a valuable goal. As Kaito (’27)states, “It was a banger.” Despite fighting tough for the second half, St. Mary’s suffered another 2 goals making it 4-1, with a disappointing own-goal from Kaito Parsons, the captain of the team. Nevertheless, Mr. Vinall was proud and believed that the JV team had made advancements from the previous match.
