The Georgia State men’s soccer team is in the midst of a rocky 1-5 start to their season.
In the first couple games, there was little-if anything-going right for the team. They had zero goals in their first three games of the season while allowing four.
Since then, however, forward Jamal Keene has done his part to get a few crocked numbers in the score column for the Panthers and even a victory last Saturday against 0-6 Seattle University.
However, a weak defense still plagues the team not giving Keene and the rest of the offense any room to breathe.
Head coach Brett Surrency told The Signal that he believes the lack of offense still is the fundamental issue.
“Tough start, no question,” Surrency said. “[They] have to score goals to win games, and that is an area that we need to show improvement. There would certainly be less pressure defensively if we were able to score some more goals.”
While goals win games, defense makes winning easier to accomplish.
More goals will not be enough.
Look at the game against the University of Las Vagas Nevada. The Panthers scored quickly within the first eight minutes of the game, but UNLV responded in four minutes to tie the game on a tapper from a few yards out. The defense went on to allow three more goals in the game.
This past weekend against Seattle, the Panthers took a 2-0 lead in the 73rd minute of the game, but one minute later the defense weakened their attack allowing Seattle’s forward to run right through them and cut the lead in half.
The defense is getting beaten in all distances: two-yard volley goals liked allowed against Evansville, and on long goals like both the ones allowed in the Panthers game against UC Riverside.
Defenders are being outmatched, being passed around and ultimately letting shots come from anywhere on the field. They are simply not competing allowing too many challenges on goalie C.J. Cochran, who had six saves against UNLV and has 18 on the season.
“At this point finding a bit more consistency in our attack is probably priority number [one],” Surrency said.
Surrency may see some occasional success in this strategy, but the defense will still have too weak of an attack on their end to make a substantial difference.
There are a lot of areas that need improvment on the men’s soccer team, but it will make things a whole lot easier for the team if the defense just defends.
