That was better. For the first time in eight games, Louisville City didn’t go down a goal in a match. For the first time since May 18 against St. Louis (geez), LouCity kept a clean sheet. And for the first time in almost a month, LouCity got all three points.
There are things to pick on about Morados’ performance against Charlotte Independence on Saturday night in Matthews, but let’s take a moment to appreciate the win. Chris Hubbard is approaching legendary status in goal. The play leading up to City’s goal was some of the best attacking movement we’ve seen from this team in a long time. Enzo Martinez is still an asshole. Brother Alex must be on another level to get sent off with a straight red just fifteen minutes into his substitute appearance for jawing at the referee.
LouCity survived going down a man, and in fact scored afterwards. They won the possession battle, won more duels and aerials, more corners, had more interceptions, more tackles, more shots, and won more fouls than the other guys. None of that is anything particularly new, as Morados are usually on the better side of those metrics than their opponent, but this time it came with three points attached.
Let’s get into the meat, then. City came out in ostensibly a 4-1-4-1 (that was more of the usual 4-3-3/4-2-3-1 hybrid we’re used to) with Paco Craig and Sean Totsch at center back, and a surprise start from Pat McMahon on the right so Oscar could play left back. Napo was listed as a central midfielder, but ultimately he and Speedy kind of played a double-pivot in the middle of the park with Magnus playing much further ahead of them. Speed merchants Antoine Hoppenot and Brian Ownby began on the right and left, respectively, of Abdou Mbacke Thiam, who started for the first time in what feels like a decade.
For a good portion of the match, LouCity had control of the run of play, and Charlotte could mostly only produce chances off counter-attacks. To be fair to the Indies, they were some pretty good counters. Chris Hubbard won my vote for Man of the Match for a good reason – every one of his three saves were nothing short of heroic. Just fantastic stuff.
Paco earned the first yellow, and the argument on the second was that if you throw your arm up post-tackle like that the you’re putting the decision in the ref’s hands. I don’t know whether Paco actually hit Enzo in the chin or not, but Enzo certainly earned a nomination for an Academy Award for his performance afterwards. Unfortunately, refs don’t work in a vacuum, and Paco has earned a reputation for playing less than cleanly this season so a card and and sending-off ensued.
Karma came around, though, and Alex Martinez pulled a USL version of a Juan Foyth when he protested a foul call against Mansally, said I don’t know what to the ref, got a yellow card for it, continued talking, and then got a red immediately afterwards. Top notch banter, there, Alex.
The squads being on equal footing again, LouCity produced some of the better attacking movement I’ve seen in a while. After having, and squandering, a couple of decent 1v1 chances against the keeper just minutes earlier, Oscar Jimenez finally made a nice driving run into Curtis Anderson’s box from the left. He sent the ball centrally to Magnus, who somehow dug the ball out from two defenders to a very aware Luke Spencer who pounded the ball into the back of the net. After that, City bravely hung on for the win.
Let’s talk numbers. City had 55.1% possession, won just over half their duels, and over 57.1% of the aerial balls. They completed over 85% of their passes, and 76.2% in Charlotte’s half. Those are some spectacular numbers. Some of that was down to the Independence playing pretty deep and offering to concede possession, but still – the best passing stats I’ve seen all season from Morados. City put in 17 crosses, a more palatable number, but only completed two of them, which isn’t great. City took 16 shots but only two were on target. Also not great, but one went in, which definitely is. Charlotte was held to nine shots with three on target.
Individually, Thiam had kind of a forgettable game. He had fewer than 20 touches on the ball, three in the box, no shots, no chances created, lost seven of eight duels, etc. Abdou strikes me as the kind of player that would function great in a counter-attacking setup.
While Paco was on the field, he passed quite well and had three interceptions. Totsch was really industrious in the match, too, and had four clearances and an interception. Pat McMahon was super solid defensively and, I thought, played a really good game at right back. He won six of nine duels, three of three in the air, two interceptions, and a shot. Oscar was even better, though, having a slightly freer role offensively. He completed 96% of his 69 passes (nice), created a couple of chances, and did the work that set up Spencer’s game winner. I was worried after the goal that he’d done something to one of his hamstrings, but he somehow toughed out the rest of the match. Hopefully it wasn’t anything serious.
Speedy and Napo were both very good centrally and did a god job breaking up play and with distribution. They created three chances between them, also good, and each took a rip or two at goal just to keep Charlotte honest. Napo had four interceptions and three tackles, while Speedy completed 93% of his 72 passes.
Maguns was much more effective in this game than he had been in previous weeks, completing 88% of his 52 passes, taking some shots, and creating the chance and getting the assist on Spencer’s goal. He also had three tackles and blocked three shots. Some people online were bitching about Hoppenot’s performance, but he was the team’s leading chance creator with three before getting subbed off for Taylor Peay after about an hour. To be fair, though, neither he nor Ownby impacted the game as much as one might have hoped.
No, City didn’t blow Charlotte’s doors off, and had to work really hard to get the goal and the win. However, after a series of disheartening results, this is something to be happy about. Hopefully the team learns from the goal they scored because for long stretches of the match they looked fairly toothless offensively. That goal was some great attacking play, however. More of that, please.
Try it on for size this coming Sunday against Atlanta. That’d be great!
