by Owen Cameros
Saturday’s match saw Junction FC hit the road for a first ever away day, as players and fans took cars, trains, and water taxis to downtown Seattle, just 20 minutes away from Nino Cantu. Memorial Stadium, which once held both the Sounders and the Reign, now hosted the defending USL 2 champions in Ballard FC. The historic stadium will go down as the first venue to feature the newest Seattle rivalry as north met west, champion met challenger.
The West Seattle newcomers drew an electric crowd. The Ballard supporters’ section was filled to the brim, but Junction FC stifled the Memorial Stadium noise for the opening 20 minutes. However, in the 24th minute, Ballard broke the deadlock after Joe Dale crossed a ball into Demian Alvarez who headed the ball across the face of the net where it was stabbed home by Austin Brummett giving the North the 1-0 lead.
Bad turned to worse for Junction FC just three minutes later. Already on the back foot, a whipped in cross from Peter Kingston found the head of Christian Engmann who’s header ricocheted off the crossbar, Diop and Buckley crashed into each other while attempting to clear the ball with the latter redirecting the ball into his own net in tragic fashion.
Peter Kingston has always been dangerous crossing the ball, but just before halftime, the Winger mishit an inswinger, which caught Lucas Martin out of position as the keeper could only hit the ball sideways into his own net.
The second half saw West Seattle bring Mani Diop forward in an attempt to create some sort of attack. However, in the 67th minute, Ballard snuffed out any potential West Seattle comeback. Lucas Martin attempted to roll the ball out to a teammate, but accidentally hit Cameron Cruz, the ball bounced straight to second half substitute Daniel Burko who passed it into an open net sealing the match at 4-0.
Junction FC will have an opportunity to avenge this defeat on Wednesday as the club continues its road trip, this time to Tacoma to play fellow new USL League Two club Tacoma Stars. The Stars remained undefeated through four games and were the only team to take points off of Ballard this season, drawing them 2-2 in the first week.
The match will begin at 7:30 at Bellarmine Stadium, and will be streamed live on the Junction FC YouTube Channel.
