Winkler Times — Out of playoffs

By Steve Martens
With one game to be played on the weekend, the Winkler Storm were out of the playoff picture in the Manitoba Major Soccer League’s First Division. They held ninth place before facing the 11th place Chilean Selects Saturday. All they needed was a draw in that outing to secure themselves a spot in First Division for next season. Winkler came through with a win over Grant Mill Sword and a draw with Elmwood over the last two weeks to keep themselves out of the relegation zone in the 12 team division.Scoring goals was the major problem for the Storm, who managed fewer than 1.5 per game in a self-described transition year that saw the melding of players from the old Third Division South Central team with the First Division Storm.“We were making one team out of two and it took a while for the guys to know each other,” said Arevalo, who was also at the Storm helm this year. He noted injuries up front also blunted the Winkler attack.Randy Froese’s nine goals led the club heading into their final game, with David Doerksen adding six and Eddie Wiens, Daniel Kroeker and Zach Pauls each chipping in with three.Elsewhere in the MMSL, the Carman Kickers are also headed to a ninth place finish. With one game to play, they still had a mathematical chance at seventh or eighth place but needed a lot of help from the teams ahead of them in Fourth Division, who still enjoyed a couple of games in hand. In Fifth Division, Morris SC sat sixth with two games left to play and almost guaranteed themselves a post-season berth.