See what Coach Albert Gross and some of his players had to say about the upcoming Tates Creek boys’ soccer season.
Jared Peck, Real-Time Sports Reporter for the Lexington Herald-Leader and co-founder of SoccerintheBluegrass.com, visited all nine Lexington high schools and spoke with coaches and players about the upcoming season. Over the next several days, SITB will release the notes and videos from those interviews that were used for the Herald-Leader’s preseason preview: Boys’ soccer: Will state’s toughest region turn out a new contender?
KHSAA link: Tates Creek schedule
Coach Albert Gross
We have what we believe to be a good young core that’s returned and we expect to take the next step forward and hopefully start competing to win some games.
The good thing about it is, you always know what you’ve got. Last year was a unique year for us since we graduated so many seniors prior and we brought in such a young class, which was good and bad. A lot of young guys got a ton of playing time and really got to see the varsity level experience and learn the game. So, I expect a lot of those young guys that gained that advantage to step up and play well for us this year.
Josh Harris in goal. He was a freshman last year and played a ton and did excellent for us and then sort of through the midfield you have a core of young guys in Spencer Waldrop, Blake Harrington and Moses playing and Ben Kaindu up top. Those are the young sophomores that saw a lot of time last year and then sprinkled in with that you have Dozier Combs who should anchor our defense and got some valuable experience last year.
I think we’ve got to learn to be a little bit more physical and aggressive, but staying within our disciplines and responsibilities in attacking and defensively. If they learn to incorporate that into their game I think we’ll be able to create some more opportunities and hopefully put the ball in the back of the net.
Ben Kaindu, leading goal scorer last year as a freshmen. Him and John Carlos, Miguel. I expect us to lean on those three players as our goal scorers.
Ben has a very good physical frame to him, great technical skill and one v one he can beat one and two defenders at one time. His unique ability as a striker is to actually find the open man. He’s pretty unselfish with the ball and sets up his teammates well. But he also possesses the ability to finish when he needs to.
Ben Kaindu, sophomore striker
I’m looking forward to rematching LCA. We lost to them in district and we need to get our revenge. I’m looking forward to try to get out of district. I think this year we could.
I’m more unselfish, but when it comes to one v one, I’ll take the one v one.
I go to this place called Sixth Street every day. Everyone’s bigger, so I’m used to that. Better foot skills, quicker with the ball now.
On what he learned last year: To always shoot. Like against LCA, if we had finished, we would have won. We weren’t playing as good as we were (capable of), and a last minute goal (by the Eagles) and we lost district.
