Morning Star Staff
The Seaton Sonics and Kalamalka Lakers have reached Thursday’s (4:15 p.m., Greater Vernon Athletics Park) North Zone Senior AA Boys Soccer League playoff final.
Top-seeded Seaton earned a berth Tuesday afternoon with a 9-0 win over No. 4 Pleasant Valley Saints of Armstrong at the Greater Vernon Athletics Park.
No. 3 Kal shaded the host Revelstoke Avalanche 3-2 in a shootout in the other Tuesday semifinal.
Hamza Alfaauri opened scoring on a rebound and a fray in front of the net, hammering home a volley at 15 minutes.
Landon Kersey redeemed himself after a near miss to an open net off of his left foot by finishing on a beautiful cross from Punyapat Srimongkol.
Striker Josiah Gaskell made it 3-0, registering his first of the season after a beautiful run from Kazuki Comley and a solid feed from Mitchell Alexander on the left side. It was 3-0 at the half.
The Sonics kept forcing the play and received distributed scoring from Chris McIntosh, Kersey, Damon Marlow (2), and Marco Monsalve Lopez (2) in the final half.
Seaton played with no substitutes as four players were dealing with sickness and injury. After an ankle injury just before half, Gaskell played valiantly in net in the second half.
The Sonics finished North Zone regular season play at 7-0, brushing back Kal 4-0 in their last tilt.
Damon Marlow jumpstarted the offence on a great midfield feed early in the first half, and defender Kenzel Aarts-Roman made it 2-0 shortly after on a great strike from outside the 18.
Jared Quibell rounded out the scoring in the first half. Kazuki Comley put the game out of reach in the second half. German import Jonas Kerksen was tested by the Laker squad and stood tall, making several key stops while also doing a great job of distributing the ball.
Coach Michel Amoua, a teacher-coach from Seaton and newly-minted Canadian citizen from the Ivory Coast, was impressed with the play of the Sonics all season.
“The boys play with a lot of energy and they all love the game,” said Amoua. “I enjoy coaching them very much. We look forward to continuing our drive to reach the Valley Championships and we aim to reach the provincial championships this year in Burnaby.”
The Sonics outscored their opponents 33-4 over the six matches this season.
Kal went ahead of Revy when Evan Winther converted on a pretty feed from Christian Disterhoft, who also scored Kal’s second goal., the equalizer with five minutes to play.
Revelstoke missed on their first shootout attempt while the next three Kal shooters scored: Disterhoft, Oliver Myer, and Luke Jones.
Kal keeper Taitum MacAulay, a monster all game, saved Revelstoke’s fourth shot, so Kal took the game without having to go to their fifth shooter, Kihun Kim.
The North Zone champion will host the Valleys next Friday-Saturday.