Boston Heroes Lilly And Smith Impressed With Home Opener

The Boston Breakers put one in the win column Saturday night with a 2-0 defeat of St. Louis Athletica. Kristine Lilly and Kelly Smith were the heroes on the night as each notched goals in the second half.

After the match both players seemed happy not only with the win, but with the 4,800 fans who came out to support them on a cold and wet Boston night.

“(The win) is important for the fans,” Lilly said in a post match press conference. “It’s our home opener. We had a great crowd with such terrible weather conditions and I think that speaks volumes for our fans.”

While the showing from the home crowd was impressive, even more impressive was the Breakers ability to deal with a very fast artificial pitch at Harvard Stadium.

“Whenever field-turf gets wet it’s very slick and it was very fast,” Lilly said. “It’s more important to play to feet, and once we started playing to feet you saw a better rhythm from our team.”

Indeed, it was Boston’s ability to play through the midfield that led to both Breakers goals, while St. Louis’ strikers struggled to cope with long balls over the top. The match was a stark contrast to Boston’s opening day loss to F.C. Gold Pride, a game in which the Breakers never really found a way to control possession.

Smith, who not only opened the scoring for Boston but set up Lilly’s goal with a delightful piece of skill, thinks that the team will continue to improve.

“Every day at practice we’re getting better; we’re looking sharper,” the midfielder said after the game. “The team that we are now is not the team that we’re going to be come the end of the season. We’re going to be a lot better.”

As for Lilly, her return to Boston, where she captained the WUSA’s Breakers, could not have come out much better. But the 37-year-old says she is just happy that there is a professional league in America once again.

“It’s great for the league to be back,” she said. “I think it’s really important for our society to have women’s sports and especially soccer. I think it gives girls an example of what they can one day be.

"The great thing about it is you have the best women’s soccer league out there. You’re seeing the best soccer from around the world. I think that’s great to see, and we had great fans out to see that tonight.”

Allen Ramsey, Goal.com

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