Tolman remains unbeaten
Blanco nets another hat trick in home win
PAWTUCKET — Tolman High head coach Danny Silva wouldn’t say he was ecstatic about his kids’ 3-1 victory over feisty Division I foe Barrington at the McKinnon-Alves Complex on Tuesday night.
In fact, he didn’t think his Tigers played all that fluidly as a team, and admitted being excited after the Eagles had sliced the hosts’ deficit to 2-1 midway through the second half.
“I was actually glad Barrington scored and made it 2-1,” he stated. “I wanted to see what we were made of; I wanted to see if we were going to let them come back and tie it up.”
“We’re going to have to face some adversity at some time, but we responded with a nice goal. We got it done when we should have, and how we should have.”
The reason he said his club needs to be tested is simple: Tolman raised its league mark to 7-0-3 overall and in league action, and remains one of only two teams throughout the top tier to be unbeaten. The other happens to be La Salle, which defeated Hendricken Tuesday night.
Over the past two games, it crushed rival Central Falls, then claimed a satisfying win over Central on Friday.
As usual, senior captain Luis Blanco highlighted the Tigers’ triumph over Barrington (4-6-2). He finished with a hat trick, which happened to be his sec-
ond in the past six days.
“He had three in the win over CF, then scored two against Central before I took him out,” Silva stated matter-of-factly. “He’s now got 14 goals and two assists in eight games. He didn’t play in the first two (this season) because he still had some conflicts with the Revs.”
Blanco made the most of a phenomenal feed from classmate Joselito Rodrigues just 2:10 into the contest. Rodrigues ripped a hard pass from the right sideline into the box, and Blanco – stationed by the far, left post – leaped and headed the ball past Eagles’ senior keeper Manoli Despines to give his club the 1-0 lead.
“I thought Luis, because of his natural abilities, did a nice job,” Silva noted. “The first goal came on a great play. Joselito made a beautiful move and Luis went up for it and knocked it in. After that, we couldn’t put three
good passes together and had problems moving it.”
That’s the way the opening stanza ended, but it appeared the visitors would tie it up before two ticks had wound down in the second half. Junior midfielder Aiden Doyle drilled a high liner on the opening boot off the crossbar; it traveled just over the extended hands of the leaping sophomore netminder Nelton Semedo (eight stops).
Five minutes later, Tolman sophomore midfielder Aliou Sissoko streaked down the right side, slipped past a defender to the end line, tucked back in and rapped a low screamer at the right post. Despines, though, was there to bat the shot away.
Exactly 2:43 later, Sissoko was rewarded for his perseverance. Now on the left side, he centered a pass inside, and it looked like it slightly bounded off a defender before Blanco chipped it home for the 2-0 cushion.