January 3, 2024 – Major Arena Soccer League (MASL) – Empire Strykers News Release
Ontario, Calif. – Having underperformed in the early phase of their 2023-24 Major Arena Soccer League (MASL) campaign, the Empire Strykers find themselves desperate for back-to-back victories in their upcoming pair of matches against host Dallas Sidekicks and the visiting Texas Outlaws. In their quest to make the playoffs after consecutive absences, the Strykers have leaned heavily on offseason arrival Stefan Mijatovic, who provided his perspective on the task ahead and the state of the team.
Mijatovic and company take on Dallas this coming Saturday at 5 p.m. PT before returning home for their meeting with Texas on Tuesday at 7:05 p.m. PT. Tickets for the crucial clash with the Outlaws are available here. Both matches will be streamed live on Twitch. A full channel lineup for MASL broadcasts may be found here.
Empire has lost five out of six contests thus far. Of those defeats, three came on the road and against favored opposition. However, the other two came at home against teams Head Coach Paul Wright’s men would have expected to beat.
Most recently, the Strykers fell 7-5 to the Tacoma Stars in front of their own fans, opposition attacker Alessandro Canale bagging a hat-trick while his teammate and indoor legend Nick Perera contributed three assists on the night. Empire’s Marco Fabián impressed yet again as he added a goal and two more assists to bring his points total since arriving in early December to seven. Notably, Mijatovic, who had thus far anchored the backline for the Strykers, spearheaded his young side’s offense and turned heads with a pair of quality tallies.
“I really think we’re at least as good as most of the teams we’ve played,” remarked the Illinois native. “We should at least have won both our home games, which would give us an even record right now. We lost by our own mistakes. When we look at the game against Tacoma, we can’t even call it rookie mistakes anymore, since some were made by our veterans. That said, I thought our tactics and formation worked out well and that we had a lot better movement. That’s definitely a good sign.”
Among several adjustments made by Head Coach Wright prior to the defeat to the Stars was the inclusion of newly signed Ontario native Harold Hanson as a forward. Hanson and Mijatovic would take turns holding up to the ball and allowing other Empire players to join the attack.
“It might not show in the results yet, but…