After losing its first game of the pre-season on Monday, Palo Alto High School’s girls’ soccer team will play the Menlo-Atherton High School Bears in a non-league game tomorrow at Paly.

On Monday, the Vikings played a non-league game against Carlmont High School and lost 2-0. Their game tomorrow will be their second pre-season game and will be their first game that counts for qualifying for the Central Coast Section playoffs at the end of the season.

After eligibility issues ended the team’s CCS run last year, the team’s main goal is for a return to CCS this year. Winning tomorrow would add momentum to a fresh start after last year’s abrupt end.

Freshman Goalkeeper Dhara Yu noted the struggles teams often face early in a new season.

“Communication was definitely an issue, [We] need more time to play with each other to get used to how everyone else plays and incorporate the new people on the team better,” Yu said. “It’ll come together more.”

Sophomore forward Nika Woodfill agrees that the team still has room to improve.

“We were still sorting things out [on Monday], but we actually did pretty well,” Woodfill said. “We played well but the result wasn’t what we wanted.”

Menlo-Atherton currently has played one game, against Menlo High School, which which ended in a tie, 1-1.

Both Yu and Woodfill view Menlo-Atherton as a competitive team.

“We know that MA [Menlo Atherton] is gonna be a pretty tough team to beat,” Yu said. “So we’re just gonna come out strong, [and] look for the win.”

The Vikings will play the Bears at 4 p.m. tomorrow at Paly’s El Camino Field.