It’s been red-ball time in Germany. Snow on the fields means the ball must be bright, or TV cameras lose it.
Joe-Max Moore, though raised in Oklahoma and Southern California, has been coping fine.
Moore has found his scoring touch, but his German Second Division club is struggling to find the winning ways that can keep it from dropping to the amateur ranks.
“We can’t figure out how to hold a lead,” said Moore, the former UCLA star and U.S. 1994 World Cup squad member who joined Saarbruecken last summer.
Moore scored eight goals in six games over Germany’s long winter break —
including a strike against First Division Eintracht Frankfurt. That secured his spot on the frontline alongside Joerg Nowotny.
After a 0-0 tie with Fortuna Duesseldorf Feb. 17, Saarbruecken faced east German club Chemnitz and took a 79th-minute lead through Moore after he turned quickly and shot through a crowd from 10 yards out. But then Moore’s team gave up the equalizer with six minutes left.
On March 4, Moore robbed a Fortuna Cologne defender 40 yards out and beat the keeper on a one-on-one to give Saarbruecken a 35th-minute lead on home turf.
But Saarbruecken foundered in the second half and lost the lead with two minutes left, going down 2-1
After that defeat, head coach Reiner Hollmann got the sack and assistant Klaus Scheer took over. Four Second Division teams drop to the Third Division at season’s end and Saarbruecken hovers at the danger zone.
“It’s going well for me,” said Moore, who turned 24 on Feb. 23. “I’ve got four league goals. I set a goal when I came here, to score 10 goals, and I’ve got some work to do. I had a slow start.”
by Soccer America Senior Editor Mike Woitalla