NASL Week 10: RailHawks on the Right Track, Scorpions Sting another Opponent
Edmonton's Michael Cox upends Strikers goalkeeper Matt Glaeser with the lone goal in Sunday's Eddies victory. Photo by Joel Belizario
It’s been a busy sports weekend with the 2012 Euro competition beginning Friday, the Heat winning the NBA Eastern Conference final, the New Jersey Devils denying the LA Kings in the NHL finals, MLB interleague play, World Cup qualifiers going on everywhere but Europe, the French Open, MLS, USL PRO and PDL soccer matches going on across the North American continent, Timothy Bradley’s upset decision over Manny Pacquiao and Lionel Messi proving again his otherworldly quality in scoring three goals in a friendly against Brazil.
The NASL provided its share of thrills this weekend too, as the Carolina RailHawks pinned the first 2012 league loss on the Minnesota Stars while the San Antonio Scorpions put the kibosh on any ideas the Atlanta Silverbacks had of building a winning streak. The Puerto Rico Islanders stayed atop the league standings by defeating the Tampa Bay Rowdies in Bayamon to complete Saturday’s action, while on Sunday FC Edmonton hosted the Fort Lauderdale Strikers and squeaked out a 1-0 victory.
Carolina RailHawks 5-1 Minnesota Stars FC
“I am very proud of the team. We had a great game offensively and were able to get the job done defensively,” said head coach Colin Clarke. “Minnesota is a tough team, and today we were able to earn the three points. The team is on the right track and we still have half the season in front of us.”
The RailHawks win demonstrated that their slow start to the season was more a sign of a team in transition than a team in severe decline. In avenging their 2011 playoff series loss to the Stars, the RailHawks have won four of their last five matches in all competitions, defeating the 2011 MLS champion LA Galaxy side and the 2010 D2 champion Islanders before crushing the undefeated 2011 NASL Champion Stars Saturday. Carolina’s only loss in their last five games was to Chivas USA in US Open Cup action Tuesday, when the Goats scored on a stoppage time penalty kick for a 2-1 win.
Five RailHawks found the back of the net for Colin Clarke’s team against the Stars. Brian Shriver and Nick Zimmerman each scored their fifth goal of the season while rookie Austen King and MLS vets Jason Garey and Zack Schilawski opened their NASL accounts.
San Antonio Scorpions 3-0 Atlanta Silverbacks
Seven thousand fans at San Antonio’s Heroes Field saw the Scorpions earn sole possession of second place in the NASL standings Saturday as the Scorpions squashed the Silverbacks 3-0. The Scorpions trail the first place Islanders by a single point, and will meet the league leaders on Saturday, June 16 in Puerto Rico.
“Our possession got better as the game wore on,” Scorpions head coach Tim Hankinson said. “I thought we pressured them throughout and I think the play of Pablo [Campos] was the best it’s been in a few games.”
The match was scoreless until the 27th minute, when Campos fired a shot on goal to beat Silverbacks keeper Daniel Illyes to put the home team a goal up. San Antonio doubled up on Atlanta eight minutes later, with Campos again involved as he delivered a ball to Estaban Bayona, the Colombian who scored 28 goals in 39 PDL contests with the Laredo Heat. Bayona found midfielder Walter Ramirez, who delivered the insurance goal that the Scorpions wouldn’t need.
The Silverbacks, who earned a win and a draw in their last two league matches, were unable to get on track offensively at Heroes Field, firing off only three shots in paving the way for a relatively easy clean sheet for the Scorpions’ Daryl Sattler, his fifth of the season. Campos scored his second goal of the match in the 83rd minute, sending Scorpions fans home happy while Alex Pineda Chacon’s club will regroup as they look to earn a positive result at home next Saturday against the rising Carolina RailHawks.
Puerto Rico Islanders 2-0 Tampa Bay Rowdies
“Just win, baby” was the motto of the swashbuckling Oakland Raiders, and perhaps no team in the NASL comes closer to the ethos of the Raiders’ motto than the Puerto Rico Islanders.
The Islanders, who will play in the Final Round of the Caribbean Football Union competition beginning June 18, took 80 minutes Saturday at the Bayamon Soccer Complex to find the game-winner against Ricky Hill’s Rowdies, but in the end the bottom line was another three points for the Puerto Rican super troopers. David Foley, who was denied on a first half penalty kick attempt by the Rowdies’ Jeff Attinella, made amends as he found defender Jay Needham following a corner kick. Needham headed the ball past Attinella for his second goal in the last two matches.
The Rowdies forced three saves by the Islanders’ goalkeeper Richard Martin in the second half, but their attempts to find the equalizer were instead betrayed by a turnover, which defender Richard Martinez carried upfield until finding teammate Jonathan Fana, who discovered a wide-open Jared van Schaik. The former University of Portland Pilot scored with moments remaining, ending any chance for the Rowdies to salvage a point.
Although Adrian Whitbread’s Islanders haven’t quite been the dominant team this season that the Carolina RailHawks were at this point last season, the club continues to roll and has by far the best goal differential in the NASL (+12 with the Scorpions second best with +5). With three of the four teams in the CFU finals guaranteed CONCACAF Champions League play, the odds are quite likely that Puerto Rico will be carrying the flag for the NASL in the region’s highest profile club competition. Meanwhile, the Rowdies will attempt to get on the good foot again when they visit the Minnesota Stars next Saturday.
Edmonton wore Drillers throwback uniforms on Sunday. Photo by Joel Belizario
FC Edmonton 1-0 Fort Lauderdale Strikers
FC Edmonton, wearing the kit of the old Edmonton Drillers club, eked out a 1-0 home win over the Fort Lauderdale Strikers despite playing shorthanded for almost two-thirds of the match. Michael Cox provided the goal that gave Harry Sinkgraven’s Eddies their third win of the season, while former Missouri State keeper Lance Parker earned the clean sheet after a long injury absence.
A scoreless first half saw Parker making a key save on a 33rd minute penalty kick attempt by Fort Lauderdale player/coach Abe Thompson minutes after an injury felled former Chicago Fire striker Andy Herron, who had to be subbed out for young Aly Hassan. It was a good news/bad news situation for FC Edmonton, as defender Antonio Rago saw red and the club was forced to play a man down for the remainder of the match.
Despite the man advantage, the Strikers couldn’t find the key to unlocking the Eddies’ defense, and it was the Calgary-native Cox who scored in the 66th minute. The second-year pro netted the game winner with help from teammates Shaun Saiko and Ilja van Leerdam. The Dutch midfielder switched the side of play with a long cross-field pass to the right flank, with Saiko receiving and firing a low cross toward the near post which Cox was able to sidefoot into the net.
The result finds the Strikers in fourth place in the table, one point ahead of the Rowdies whom they beat last week, and two points ahead of the Eddies and the surging RailHawks. Daryl Shore’s Strikers and FC Edmonton meet again next Saturday at Lockhart Stadium.
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I am still thoroughly disgusted by the putrid effort I saw on Sunday afternoon from Edmonton. The entire Strikers team from Coach Shore to every man on that field yesterday should be ashamed and embarrassed. What a joke to follow up a HUGE home win against your biggest rival with that pathetic effort. Coach Shore either had a lot of player issues no one outside the organization is aware of that handcuffed him in this game, or he went back to last year’s methods of choosing his starting lineups – picking names out of a hat. Maybe he just took Edmonton for more lightly than he should have, I don’t know.
No Anderson we already knew about thanks to last week’s Ultras Alive broadcast. But, where was Restrepo and Laing? Neither even made the trip. Why was Stahl seated on the bench all game, our captain and oh yeah, best defender, a guy who is certainly rested thanks to having missed the Rowdies game due to suspension last week?
Herron, while he was in there, spent more time demonstratively berating his teammates for what were, admiteddly, some pretty poor passes, then he did making anything better out of the possession the Strikers dominated in the 1st half than the guys he was yelling at. Abe was terrible, just terrible. He was fortunate the pk he took against the Rowdies last week went in, and this weak effort was easily saved by Parker. He also made a complete mess of another perfect goal scoring opportunity. Hassan seems to be feast or famine. When he’s on his game, he nets hat tricks. When he’s not, he looks lost and is easily dispossessed of the ball. Morales….holy crap it’s like a broken record with me. Turnover after turnover, bad pass after bad pass, not getting back to defend time and again…when will it end Shore? When will somebody else get a chance in MF? Your bench is FULL of MF’s with the exact same type of game as him! How about giving one of them a chance?!? They certainly can’t be any worse! Motagalvan is someone Shore has talked about repeatedly as if he is the guy that will turn this MF around and raise the level of play for the team. So far I don’t see it at all. Pecka and Gebor have both played head and shoulders better than him in a defensive MF role.
Lorenz has struggled at left back. He was playing some damn good soccer at left MF, teaming with Laing at left back. They played off each other very well. But when Lance is out (still nothing from the team about why one of their best players is absent from a crucial league match) he’s the only option they have with experience at left back, and he just doesn’t seem to hold up back there as well as Lance defensively, and obviously he’s not as dynamic pushing forward. Ramos is a young kid with speed, but he didn’t look very sharp at all given significant minutes yesterday either. On this surface in Edmonton, with the water, his ball skills which looked good in some minutes at home, just can’t be employed with the same effectiveness.
Wow. That’s about all I can say to keep from pulling my hair out. Wish someone could ask Coach Shore what in blazes he was thinking with the personnel choices for this match. And then the effort on the field just didn’t get it done. Yes Edmonton packed it in a lot in the back, especially after the goal, but you gotta find a way to produce SOMETHING resembling a decent scoring chance, or a shot that is actually ON GOAL. This team had absolutely no clue what to do in the final third in the second half of this game, and it cost them what should have all rights been three crucial road points. There is LOTS of work this week leading up to the back end of the home and home. We better see the kind of effort we saw in the 2nd half at Lockhart against the Rowdies this week, or it’s going to be a long, quiet summer the rest of the way at Lockhart……