GLOUCESTER — It was the same old story for the Gloucester boys soccer team in last night's season finale against Danvers.
The Fishermen fought hard, played solid defense and won their fair share of 50-50 balls. But as they have all season long, the Fishermen struggled to score goals en route to a 1-0 loss at the hands of the Northeastern Conference Small champion Falcons.
While disappointed with the loss, Gloucester head coach James Cook was happy with the way his team fought on Senior Night against the top team in the conference, who happens to be unbeaten.
"We aren't going to the tournament and (Danvers) had an undefeated season, but watching the game you wouldn't know who was who," Cook said. "We just weren't able to score, that's pretty much been our season, we haven't been outclassed by anybody but it's been a matter of us putting a goal in net or not. If we qualified the for the tournament I'm sure we would give any of those teams a game."
While Gloucester (6-9-3) is talented at pretty much every position on the field, they lack a true goal-scorer. Senior captains Chris Peritore and Anthony LaRocca filled in valiantly according to Cook. The two, however, did not play their natural positions. Peritore scored a team-high 11 goals on the season, but in the Northeastern Conference All-Star Game both he and LaRocca played defense.
"The only thing we lack is a true scorer," Cook said. "We stack up with anybody at every other position. Chris and Anthony have done a great job for us up front and have gotten some big goals for us, but they are playing out of position and being asked to carry the offense."
The Fishermen and the Falcons played to a scoreless and even first half, as each team had their opportunities to score. The Falcons had more chances in the half and controlled the ball in their offensive zone, but the Fishermen had the best scoring chance of the half. LaRocca started a rush up field and hit Peritore with a perfect cross field pass, but Peritore just missed high of the net and the game remained scoreless into halftime.
Danvers got on the board with the game-winning goal early in the second half. Freshman Eric Martin took advantage of a Gloucester mistake in their own end and snuck a shot past Gloucester goalie Chase Kelly just inside the right post in the 46th minute. Martin's goal was assisted by Nick Amico.
Struggling to find offense, the Fishermen turned up the pressure in the final minutes of the game, and while they got the ball into the box several times, they weren't able to fire a shot on goal.
"We played a good first half and had some decent scoring opportunities," Cook said. "But I was a little disappointed in the second half. I thought we would ride the momentum we had at the end of the second half but we made some mistakes. On their goal we had a miss hit and we were out of position."
