Scarboro has won a record third successive Froccer Cup, defeating City 2-1 at Dunn Stadium on Saturday.
Like last year, the weather looked like being pretty ordinary for the big match, with clouds overhead and a strong north-westerly wind blowing. But again we were lucky and the rain held off for the duration of the annual match of "soccer in a frock".
City won the toss, which was a good start as it's the first win of any sort we've had in this match for three years, and elected to kick with the wind. As expected, the ball was in City's attacking half for most of the quarter but, in a story familiar to long-time supporters of the team, the finishing off in front of goal just wasn't there.
Even so, the domination of possession and field position in the quarter left the team feeling pretty confident at te break. City Captain/Coach James O'Toole gave an inspiring speech to fire up the team - it had passion, spirit and fire. The only thing lacking was any mention of actual tactics or plans.
Scarboro had the wind in the second, so the City team weren't able to be as attacking. But things were still looking good until City goalkeeper Colin Slattery, making his Froccer debut, pulled a hamstring and had to come off.
Of course any self-respecting, decent, fair and sportsman-like team who sees their opposition in this situation do the right thing and hold up the game to allow a fair substitution and re-settling of the affected team. Unfortunately, though, we were playing against Scarboro who took advantage of the brief period on confusion over just who was City's goalie to put one into the net and take the lead into half time.
Despite being a goal down the City team were still confident of being able to take the game. With the wind behind them again in the third quarter, it was only a matter of time before the inevitable happened and Greg Tate slotted the equaliser.
The final quarter was pretty evenly fought, but with just a few minutes remaining before extra team Scarboro striker Damien Marangon, later named Best On Ground, put Scarboro back in front. City went all-out to score as the seconds ticked down and had several chances, but just couldn't convert, leaving Scarboro to take the trophy for the third successive year.
| Scarboro | 2 | (D.Marangon 26m, 54m) | |
| City | 1 | (G.Tate 41m) |
Cup History
| Year | Winner | ||
| 1999 | City | ||
| 2000 | City | ||
| 2001 | Scarboro | ||
| 2002 | Scarboro | ||
| 2003 | City | ||
| 2004 | Scarboro | ||
| 2005 | Scarboro | ||
| 2006 | Scarboro |
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