Barons begin travels in New York

First of four straight road games begins Sunday against the first place Westchester Flames

The Ocean City Barons start a run of four consecutive road matches against division rivals with a visit to the Westchester Flames this Sunday. This will be a pivotal match for both sides and should produce a very competitive game.

The image http://liblib.nease.net/CONCACAF/United_States/Westchester_Flames.gif cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.Westchester is off to a terrific start and has already matched their win total (3) from last season. The Flames enter this weekend with a 3-1-1 record, a conference-best 12 goals scored and sitting in first place atop the Northeast Division.

Leading the Flames again this year is Harvard product, Charles Altcheck (8 goals in 2005) who has four goals and two assists already this season, including a late game-winning goal against the Richmond Kickers Future. This year, Altcheck has the support of their sensational young striker, Charlie Davies of the U.S. Under-20 National Team and Boston College University. Davies is widely regarded as one of the top young talents in the nation and has already proven his goal-scoring ability with four goals in his first five games.
 
Barons’ player/coach John Thompson is well-aware of the talent on the Flames roster this year.
 
“Westchester have made a remarkable turnaround from last season. They have a new coach (Ernest Inneh) who had a lot of success with Westchester a few years ago, so it’s not a great surprise to us.”
 
Thompson added, “We know enough about Charlie Davies to equip ourselves against him. He is teammates with (Barons’ goalkeeper) Issey Maholo at Boston College, so he has filled us in.”

The Barons look to keep up the pace now that they won their first game (2-0 vs. Albany) and broke the goal drought that had stretched to 336 minutes. The Barons’ Jeremy Ortiz came on as a second half substitute and made an impact last week against the Albany Admirals. Oritz ended the team’s scoring drought when he headed home a cross in the 69th minute, and later added a second goal in stoppage time thanks to an impressive individual effort from A.J. Colubiale who assisted on the score.

Ocean City will travel to New York with a full squad, with the exception of Dave Daigle, who is still recovering from a thigh strain.

Sunday’s confrontation will be different than matches in the past. Last year, the Barons won both meetings by a combined score of 9-3. One advantage the Barons might have over the Flames is that this will be the second match in as many days for Westchester. They will be returning home from a short trip to Brooklyn to take on the Knights on Saturday night.
 
“They are a legitimate contender to win the division title,” said Thompson. “This is a big game for us, especially with them being five points ahead of us.”

Fans who can’t make the trip to City Park Stadium in New Rochelle, NY can listen to the game live online by visiting the Ocean City Barons’ website.

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