Condor 1, Santa Rosa 1

In its first three games this season, Condor was lucky in one and disappointed in the other two.

But by their standards, that's pretty good. And the Condor faithful took notice.

About eight hundred fans come out to the stadium to watch the team take on Santa Rosa yesterday afternoon. It is great to see the community embrace a team that has underachieved for so many years. (If you recall, last year's team was the most successful in recent memory, and I didn't see them score a goal in the three games I attended.)

Despite allowing final-minute goals in consecutive weeks, a win against Santa Rosa would have put Condor at the top of the division and in prime position to advance to the next round.

And for 88 minutes, it looked like Condor would do just that. But once again, a late-game defensive letdown cost Condor the victory.

Once again, Condor had to swallow a bitter tie in a game that it should have won.

Let's put aside all of the blown opportunities to take a 2-0 lead and put Santa Rosa out of the game. (Because if I think about those, it just gets more frustrating) But just recall that if Condor had anything resembling a half-capable striker, it would be winning each of its games by at least three or four goals. But they don't. They didn't even score their lone goal yesterday. Santa Rosa kicked the ball into their own net.

So let's think about what they do have - moderately adequate defense. They have not allowed a single goal in the first 88 minutes of any game this year, which means that they have to be doing something right.

But last-minute, game-tying goals for three straight weeks.

Why does the team repeatedly collapse in the final moments, costing valuable points in the overall standings?

Now, I don't really know who to blame. I'm pretty sure there's enough to go around. Also, I probably don't know enough about soccer to assign blame. But I have seen enough late-game breakdowns to rant for a few lines.

The players probably get tired toward the end of matches and might lose focus. Ninety minutes is a long time to stay mentally sharp on defense. But in soccer, you have to stay sharp for more than 90 minutes if you want to win. Because all it takes is one breakdown in the 95th minute to squander 94 minutes of well-played soccer. Condor showed that two weeks ago in Puerto Bolivar.

The coach could have called for a specific strategy that was the right one at the time, but the players just didn't execute it properly. The players might have been told to continue attacking, knowing that 1-0 is not a comfortable lead. But maybe the players started to feel comfortable and thought they could coast.

But after three weeks of the same story, I'm starting to look at coach Roberto Salazar. He needs to get the point across to his players. If its a technical breakdown, that needs to be corrected. If it's a focus issue, he should get his team focused for the full 90 minutes of play.

Salazar needs to shore things up if Condor wants to advance to the next round of the tournament. Condor currently sits in second place in the overall standings (six points). Santa Rose leads (eight points) and next week's opponent, Fuerza Amarilla, is in third (four points). The top two teams advance, and there are two more weeks of matches.

A win against Fuerza Amarilla would nearly guarantee Condor's classification for the next round. But a home loss would definitely put that in question.

After writing those last few paragraphs, I thought that I might have turned into your standard, illogical soccer fan, who blames every problem on the coach and then says that said coach is worthless and should be fired. I feel that my analysis was logical enough, and fair enough to Prof. Salazar (all soccer coaches are referred to as professor here).

Nuggets:

• I was really the Condor's fans showing up this week. But I was a bit disappointed in the instruments they brought to cheer on the local squad.

Santa Rosa travelled with what appeared to be a full percussion section, plus some guy with a horn that made all sorts of noises.

Condor didn't have anything. We need cowbell.

• The local radio station broadcasts every soccer game. But they don't have any fancy transmitting equipment at the stadium. Instead, the announcers just talk into the radio station owner's cell phone, which is connected to the microphone at the radio studio.

• The AREvista soccer reporter has helped out with the radio broadcast the last few weeks as the official time keeper and score board reporter. It's pretty cool for him.