The start of the 2010 season has been rough for H.M. King High School’s varsity girls soccer team - 1-2-1 overall going into the weekend - whose game against Roma this past Tuesday ended in a 2-2 tie. Vonique Rodriguez scored the Lady Brahmas’ first goal with an assist from Mary Yeary. Rebecca Campos scored H.M. King’s second goal.

“We played very good in the first half, we were moving and swarming to the ball and jumped ahead 2-0,” Head Coach Wayland Sanders said. “The first 20 minutes of the second half were still great, which has kind of been our story thus far this season, but the last ten minutes of the game we had some mental breakdowns and it cost us the win as Roma scored their two goals. We seem to have a tendency of allowing the last ten minutes of games to beat us, playing for 70 minutes instead of the full 80 has cost us.”

H.M. King’s habit of relaxing late allowed the Gladiators to move the ball more.

“We gave Roma time to control the ball instead of pressuring them like we had been, before that they did not have time to control the ball because we were on top of them,” Sanders said. “Those last ten minutes we allowed them to trap the ball and Roma just started playing it through and outran our defense.”

The Lady Brahmas also lacked aggressiveness in their opening season scrimmage against Gregory Portland.

“We came out kind of flat and timid and did not pressure the ball like I know we can,” Sanders said. “G.P. is a very good team that is big and aggressive and we let them control the ball most of the game. When we did get the ball, instead of passing and moving it we were just trying to clear it while playing on our heels most of the time.”

Following the scrimmage, H.M. King finished sixth at a tournament held in Beeville. The Lady Bulls lost their first game to San Antonio Roosevelt, defeated Callalen and lost to Weslaco East. Still, Sanders mentioned, the Lady Brahmas have corrected some of their flaws while dealing with early season injuries.

“We have improved in every game, there is no doubt about that, and we have had some injuries on defense which has caused us to switch from a 3-4-3 formation and go back to a 4-4-2,” Sanders said. “One of our star defenders (Marie Nolan) hurt her ankle during the G.P. scrimmage so we moved up a freshman (Bianca Cordero) from the junior varsity team. So right now we are playing a little more conservative.”

Things should improve for H.M. King once the girls begin playing smarter.

“I think our nerves at the beginning of games are everywhere because we’re excited,” Sanders said. “We do better when we settle down and play smarter.”