Last Sunday concluded a week long fight in Lancaster, among soccer clubs in the West Region and Arsenal FC’s boys’ 16U squad, featuring Brian Blumenfeld of La Cañada and Alex Berger of La Crescenta, went home with championship medals.
The semifinals match was against a rival So Cal team — West Coast. West Coast was up 1-0 and in injury time, in the very last play of the game, with their goalie in the opposing box, Arsenal took a corner kick that took a serious bend and flew past all 21 players in the box without touching anyone, to tie it. Arsenal won it in overtime, 2-1.
In the finals, the scrappy Arsenal squad went down 3-1 at halftime. Looking like their luck had run out, the boys managed a major comeback and won it, 4-3, to win the tournament.
