Mike Callahan may not have played for Richmond last night, but it’s obvious he has been doing extra training with the team. Louisville City escaped with a point last night, but maybe more impressively, they escaped without anybody getting hurt.

LCFC extended their league shutout streak to four matches, and got a result for the ninth straight match in all competitions, as they were held to a 0-0 draw against the Kickers on Saturday night. With the marathon match against Detroit City still wearing on the team three days later, the players saw a lot of rotation tonight. The starting lineup saw three changes with Guy Abend, Sean Reynolds, and Mark-Anthony Kaye (who will never fly United ever again) come into the team. Coach James O’Connor would use all five substitutions in this match, with only Enrique Montano (seriously, what is going on there? Another article for another time…) and Scott Goodwin not coming into the match.

To be honest, there wasn’t a lot going on in this match in terms of scoring chances—which is frustrating considering that the Kickers played a man down for the final thirty minutes. The team looked quite tired and Coach O’Connor agreed, saying the team looked “really tired and really jaded.”  The attacks seemed to lack energy, there were few instances where we could beat a defender, and quite honestly the team looked content to get a point and go home. The two players who were able to attack the most for the team were actually the fullbacks, Ben Newnam and Kyle Smith. Unfortunately, they had nobody to get the ball to.

However, Richmond showed that Callahan had been teaching them how to be nasty players, as there were multiple instances of hard, bordering on reckless, challenges all over the pitch—many of which escaped a booking. That would change in the second half, as the referee began to pay for not controlling the match earlier. Alex Lee would be shown two yellow cards in a ten minute span, bringing about his marching orders. They would spend the final half hour pinned inside their own end of the pitch, as they hunkered down against what attack LCFC could muster.

Greg Ranjitsingh once again was a rock in the back, and while he was only called into action a few times, they were important saves to make and he made them well. The team changed with the introduction of Paolo DelPiccolo, who once again was able to run the offense from his holding midfield position with ease. However, it simply was not enough to break down the Kickers in the final third, and LCFC would have to settle for a draw, preserving their unbeaten record against Richmond.

Louisville City now has a week off before another rough week. They travel to Charleston on Saturday night, with a 7:30 pm kickoff. Then, they will travel up I-65 to face Indy XI in the US Open Cup 3rd round on Wednesday, June 1st, before traveling to sunny Florida to take on Orlando City B on the 5th of June.