WHO: Charlotte Independence, 5W-9D-8L, 24 points, 11th place, Eastern Conference

WHAT: A regular season USL Championship match

WHEN: Saturday, August 3, 2019, 7:00 p.m.

WHERE: Sportsplex at Matthews, 2425 Sports Parkway, Matthews, NC 28105

WATCH: On TV on WBKI, on the internets at ESPN+ (subscription required), and listen on the radio on one of the local iHeart Media AM stations.

WHO, AGAIN? Charlotte’s had an…interesting season. They started off with a guy who made his bones in Gaelic football as a head coach. When that predictably went poorly, the fired him midseason and brought Mike Jeffries, the club’s only other manager ever, back to the helm.

Jeffries’ tenure started out with a pasting of Birmingham in Matthews. The second game of his second tenure was at Slugger Field, where the Jacks walked away with a 1-1 draw. Since then, Independence had tacked on six more games unbeaten until an unexpected loss last week to Legion in Birmingham.

On the season, Charlotte’s scored 25 goals with a 12.2% conversion rate, but have given up 32. They’re a decent enough passing and possession team, but having watched them play Louisville City enough times under Jeffries, they’re comfortable with giving up the ball to play on the counter, too. Players to watch for, as always, are Jorge Hererra and the Martinez brothers, as well as Dominic Oduro.

City will be without Alexis Souahy for this match thanks to his red card last week against Loudoun United. Paco Craig is also one yellow card away from a second suspension for card accumulation, as he has seven on the season.

I honestly don’t know whether we’ll see anything new tactically from our Morados tomorrow. All reports indicated that the belief inside the locker room is that “the plan is good, the execution is not,” so look out for another set of interesting lineup decisions to try and find some way to actually convert the embarrassment of shots LouCity takes into at least a goal or two.

It could happen! Let’s hope it does. VAMOS MORADOS!