Crossfire 1-1 Against Inter Milan in Hong Kong

Going further than any US youth team has gone before in the current format of the NIKE Manchester United Premier Cup World Championships the Crossfire Premier team from Redmond, WA, placed eighth out of twenty teams. They did this by tying world famous Inter Milan in their final placement game only to fall one spot in penalty kicks.

This was the second game where penalty kicks afterwards cost the Washingtonians precious placement ranking in the tournament. Against the Italians it was two shots off the wide post that did the damage. It the first minute of the game it looked like it was going to be Crossfire’s day as Ellis McLoughlin took a throw-in from defender Ty Klein, breezed pass the Milan defense and deft put a shot hard into the wide corner. The Inter goalie could only stand and watched. Crossfire continued to put the pressure on stringing together pass after pass and testing the Inter defenders with constant pressure. Chances were created but the Italian boys in white were up to the task. Milan’s only threat came on a corner kick where a clear shot was headed out of the goal on an alert play by defender Jordon Softli.

The second half continued like the first with most of the play in midfield. Center half Danny Wenzel nursing a leg injury the entire match was tenacious in his defense and imaginative in his distribution of the ball constantly setting up the Crossfire attack. His partner Brandon Zimmerman frustrated Milan as he had opponents all tournament with thundering tackles time and time again giving his teammates procession.

Kellan Brown and Jonathan Castro brought added energy off the bench to bolster the Crossfire attack. Both attackers used hard work to free themselves in the box and had dangerous shots. The Italians clawed their way back in the game midway through the second half when they had numbers in the box and hit a “seeing eye dog shot” that found its way through a crowd just past the outstretched hands of goalkeeper Brooks Hopp.

When the final whistle blew it was clear that both sides had left nothing on the field. The end ranking was decided by penalty kicks where for the second game in a row Crossfire fell short 4-3. Still they left the field satisfied knowing that they had played straight up in their last two games against a duo of clubs that are considered among the best in the world.

Thanks Brian Klein and Anita Wenzel for the help following the event.