Wed July 13, 2016 League 1 Ontario L1O Cup Semifinal--Vaughan Azzurri vs Master's Futbol (from League 1 Ontario website)

Vaughan Through To L1 Cup Final Following 3-0 Victory Over Masters
07/14/2016, 10:00pm EDT
By League1 Ontario staff

Vaughan Azzurri put away three unanswered goals in their Wednesday night L1 Cup 
semi-final against Masters FA Saints, progressing through to the Cup final after 
tallies from Jarek Whiteman (23'), Joseph Di Chiarra (25' penalty) 
and Jonathan Lao (62').

The clean sheet was earned by Vaughan keeper Jared Brown.

"I'm happy with the final score, but we still have more work to do," 
said assistant coach, Wayne Mills. "Defensively we need to be more organized, 
and more committed to our philosophy defensively. Yes we scored goals, 
and great result, but we still have work to do."

The first chance of the match fell to Masters, with a penalty awarded within 
the first twenty minutes after a handball in the box. Keeper Brown guessed 
correctly, diving low to his right to palm away the effort.

Whiteman's opener came after a 40 yard run from Di Chiarra, who picked 
up the ball from Brown, and after striding through the midfield laid 
a through ball into the path of Whiteman. A couple shimmies sold the dummy 
to the defender, and Whiteman cut inside to unleash a shot into the 
top corner.

Di Chiarra grabbed one of his own only minutes later, expertly slotting 
a penalty to give the Azzurri a healthy lead on the scoreboard. 

"It was a good game," said Di Chiarra. "I thought we were consistent 
throughout and we put a lot of pressure on a Masters team that sat back 
quite a bit."

"We connected a lot of passes, created a lot of chances, and I think 
we deserved the 3-0 result. I think we could have had more even, 
but 3-0 is fair." 

There is always room for improvement, possibly the final third where 
we could have finished more chances, connected more passes," he added, 
"but we held them accountable and kept them in check most of the game. 
I thought we did well throughout."

Lao finished off the night for the Azzurri after back to back deflections 
from shots by Jason Mills and Malcolm Loukides, Lao rising to meet 
a rebound in the air and redirect the header past sprawling defenders 
and into the side netting.

Masters head coach Andrey Saveliev accepted the defeat, and spoke 
to the transition his squad is going through at present.  

"The difference tonight was simply that one team scored and the other 
team did not score," he said. "We had a difficult time, because 
we have some players that are working during the week and then are 
exhausted for training, and so it is difficult to get the preparation 
we need."

"We are working now on a youth team for next season, and I think you 
will be surprised," he added. "We had only two chances to score 
tonight, and of course the missed penalty. Not good enough for 
a result really."

Vaughan Azzurri - 2014 L1 Cup champions - will now proceed to the 
men's L1 Cup final on July 30 (7 p.m.) at the Ontario Soccer Centre 
versus Woodbridge Strikers - the 2015 L1 Cup holders.

Di Chiarra, Vaughan's man of the match for the 2014 L1 Cup final, 
said the squad was looking forward to the occasion.

"I believe we are playing Woodbridge in the final and rivalries 
don't get any bigger than that," he said. "I can't wait, it should 
be a good one." 

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