Booters Aim for Consistency at Amherst

Offensively sporadic for a half but defensively superb throughout its opening victory over MIT last week, Harvard's soccer team visits a large unfriendly crowd, a short field, and a mediocre soccer foe this afternoon at Amherst.

"We weren't pleased with our showing against MIT," assistant coach Elliot Klein said yesterday. "The main problem was with our offense; too much individual effort and not enough team play."

Last year, the Crimson easily over-powered Amherst, 3-1, with the Lord Jeffs' lone goal coming on a fluke play. This season, Amherst has yet to win, having lost to Dartmouth, 3-1, and last week to Lafayette, 2-1.

Very Wary

Even so, the Crimson is not taking the game lightly. "Oh no, we're very wary playing at Amherst; they always have a large and loud crowd at their games," goalie Shep Messing explained last night.

Two other conditions will also be working against the Crimson this afternoon. The field at Amherst is shorter from 15 to 20 yards in length and width than the regulation size field on which Harvard practices.

And there is the bus trip the team must make to Amherst before the game. It is a longer than normal trip for the team and may leave the squad tired and tight. "It is a very long trip, but we'll be leaving about 11 a.m., so we can stop the bus about half-way and let the players get out and stretch a little," Klein said.

In last Wednesday's season opener against MIT, the Crimson's defense was completely impenetrable. The Engineers rarely controlled the ball outside their end of the field and didn't get off one good shot during the game.

Harvard's offense was less impressive. Even though the Crimson managed nearly 60 shots against its outmanned rivals, Phil Kydes' second-period tally was the only score on the board at halftime.

Clicking

In the second half, coach Bruce Munro's new offensive formation began to click. The offense started to open up and four goals floated in, one right after the other, for a 5-0 victory.

The bulk of this week's practice sessions has dealt with maintaining throughout a match a constant offensive quality superior to that of even the second half of the MIT contest. Klein would not comment on the specific techniques employed this week to accomplish the goal but said that definite steps have been taken. "We'll just have to see how it works out against Amherst; we should improve," he said.