by Rod Hughes
Well, the soccer season has begun again and for thousands of fans in this country, there’s something to look forward to once more.
Alajuela fans can rejoice after yesterday’s drubbing of a surprised Liberia team, 4-1.
For a time in the first part, neither team shone, then Liberia drew first blood with a corner kick that Freddy Segura converted into a 1-0 score at minute 47. The Liberia fans in Alajuela’s Morera Soto Stadium went wild. Earlier they had been treated to a near-goal by ex-Alajuela star Rolando Fonseca who surprised goalie Wardy Alfaro and almost had his revenge on his old team.
But Segura’s goal proved to be like an alarm clock for Alajuela, awakening the lion. Luis Lara evened the score for Alajuela 10 minutes later and Victor Nunez put the team ahead a few minutes after and then it was all downhill for Liberia. Two minutes later Pablo Nasser made it 3-1 and in the closing minutes Nunez made his second goal.
The black and red gang has had two previous lackluster seasons. Could this year be the one that sets them on track again?

by Rod Hughes
Costa Rica’s under-20-year-old All Star team beat Scotland Saturday in the world tournament for youthful soccer teams, but the hoped for miracle didn’t happen. The figures still turned out badly for them and they were eliminated.
The soccer world is full of might-have-beens. If the Canadians had beaten the Congo team…But the Congo was just too strong and Canada lost, 2-0. If the Ticos had made just one more goal…
Mark Reynolds of Scotland opened the scoring just 18 minutes into the game but Pablo Herrera tied it for Coata Rica in the second half and Jonathon McDonald capped the victory during the waning minutes of make-up time by blasting in the winning goal.
For this game, past deficiencies had been cured, so the Costa Ricans can be proud of their youth. Despite a savaging by sportswriters, their recond was respectable.

by Rod Hughes
The under-20-year-old All Star team from Costa Rica lost 1-0 against their Japanese counterparts yesterday in the world soccer championship tourney in Canada, edging closer to an early elimination.
The team played by the book, fearing to make a mistake, losing the element of surprise and therefore lost. But what do you expect, after the savaging they recieved from local sportwriters after their 1-0 loss to Nigeria? And mistakes happen in soccer, momentarily and unexpectedly. Take the error of a very good midfielder, Celso Borges, at minute 67 that allowed Japan’s Amotu Tanaka to boot in the only goal of the game, for example. It would have made little difference if earlier attacks had been rammed home with confidence. The score would have been 2-1.
And even local sportwriters must admit that when they were good in Victoria, they looked very good, indeed. As the game went on, the attacks were pressed forward more positively but also with an element of desperation that leads to imprecision.
“The truth is that there are no words (to describe the feeling) when the team plays well only to lose clear options to score,” a frustrated forward Luis Stewart Pérez told the daily La Nacion.
So the blue, white and red team is on the brink of going home, with no points, the same as the Scottish eleven, whom they have yet to play and whose division they share. As La Nación’s sportswriter Rodrigo Calvo says, only a miracle can send them into a second round. But in 1990, the senior All Stars made it into the second round of the World Cup by beating a Scottish team.
Maybe history will repeat itself. Anything can happen in this game…

by Rod Hughes
Ah, sportswriters are a bitter class, are they not?
While the Costa Rican under-20-year-old All Star team held its own against a strong Nigerian side in the world soccer championship tourney for young players yesterday, the sportswriter for the daily paper Al Dia told his readers this morning that the nude man who invaded the field during the second half stole the show!
So let’s get our nudist out of the way. While the Tico players stood aghast, the bare man jumped the barrier at Royal Athletic Park stadium in Victoria, Canada, and ran across the field. Then he lay down in a show of passive resistence until police carted him off. Big deal!
Does that have anything to do with Nigeria’s Brown Ideye getting past the Tico defense and planting a goal between the uprights five minutes later? Somehow we rather doubt it.
Well, it is true that excellent young goalie Alfonso Quesada saved the Ticos from two sure goals more, but that’s part of the game. And that coach Geovanni Alfaro admits that the midfield play left a great deal to be desired during the first half. But that deficiency was corrected before the second.
Next, the Ticos face a strong Japanese side who have taken their style from the South Americans.
And, sportwriters, lighten up and let these young players show what they can do, eh?