North Carolina FC 1 – 2 Indy Eleven
Cary, NC—Three of the most important points of the 2019 campaign were on the line as North Carolina FC hosted Indy Eleven. The evenly-matched teams have been locked in a battle for third place in the USL Championship Eastern Conference. Indy has a couple of games in hand, adding even more importance to picking up points Saturday night.
Even with that motivation, NCFC got off to a sluggish start and never got out of first gear in the first half of the game.
Dre Fortune scored the equalizer and got North Carolina back in the game.
Indy jumped on the attack early in the match and nearly got on the board in the fifth minute when they took advantage of some disorganization in the NCFC defense. Defender Aaron Guillen slid across the box to tackle the ball away but it bounced to Indy forward Ayoze Garcia. North Carolina goalkeeper Alex Tambakis came out of the net to make a play and appeared to clip Garcia but referee Guido Gonzalez did not call a penalty on the play.
The Dead Whales had their first look at goal in the tenth minute when forward Donovan Ewolo drew a foul on Indy’s Patrick Barrett. Midfielder Dre Fortune drove the ball around the wall, but Indy goalkeeper Evan Newton made the save.
Matt Watson opened the scoring in the 15th minute with a low, lethal strike that blew past a screened Tambakis.
Victor Igbekoyi gave North Carolina a chance to pull level in the 36th minute when he read a pass out of Indy’s back line and disrupted the play. He took a couple of touches and, in a bit of a nod to his old role as a midfielder, put some heat on his shot but it was blocked out for a corner.
Yamikani Chester, who had been kept quiet for most of the first 40 minutes, gave Newton his biggest test of the half with hard shot that forced Newton into a dive to keep it from going in near-post.
A sequence in the game’s 43rd minute was a vignette of just how poorly the first half was going for North Carolina. Midfielder Nazmi Albadawi challenged Indy’s Kenney Walker for the ball at the midfield circle. Walker sold the tackle, drawing Gonzalez’s whistle. In a fit of pique, Albadawi booted the ball away, earning himself a golden ticket from Gonzalez. When the whistle blew for halftime, the Dead Whales found themselves behind and looking for a way to get back into the game.
“For whatever reason, our first half was poor,” NCFC head coach Dave Sarachan said after the game. “We didn’t apply pressure, we allowed them time and space. The quality of our passing was poor. They (Indy) outplayed us, plain and simple.”
Manny Perez was back in North Carolina’s lineup after an ankle injury.
Sarachan made his first change at halftime, swapping midfielder Graham Smith in for Manny Perez. The change allowed for Albadawi to shift forward more with Fortune with Smith holding. The adjustment paid some immediate dividends for the Dead Whales as they pressured Indy’s defense right out of the gate with three corner kicks in the first five minutes of the second frame.
Albadawi and Ewolo started asking questions of the Eleven and Smith himself put on a couple of moves deep in Indy’s end and tried to send the ball across the six-yard box to Ewolo but Newton got a foot on it to knock it out for another corner. Ewolo would have another golden opportunity in the 57th minute on a header off of a Ben Speas corner kick but he couldn’t get the ball down and Newton tipped it over the bar for another corner.
Finally, in the 69th minute, NCFC’s pressure paid off. With the ball deep in Indy’s final third, Ewolo held the ball up and slid a pass out to Guillen outside the 18. Guillen spotted Fortune making a run and sent a perfectly-weighted pass right into his stride and into one of his favorite spots to shoot from. Fortune settled the ball quickly and then blasted a right-footer into the upper-90 to even the game.
“It was like training,” Fortune described his goal after the game. “It was just kind of all in one motion, just kind of natural movement and I was happy to bring us level.”
Both teams played with a certain amount of caution for the final 20 minutes, but neither side was shy about making a run when an opportunity presented itself. Newcomer Justin Rennicks nearly opened his account just as he stepped onto the field for North Carolina when he took on Nevea Hackshaw deep in Indy’s defensive end. Moments later, Smith unleashed a screamer that was deflected wide.
Just when it seemed that the two clubs would share the points, Ayoze got on the ball near North Carolina’s goal line and chipped the ball toward the six-yard box where
NCFC midfielder Ben Speas and forward Donovan Ewolo try to build a scoring play against Indy Eleven.
Ilija Ilic slipped free of his defender and beat Tambakis with a diving header to give Indy back the lead in the 87th minute. Tambakis was called on to make a big stop in the 90th minute to keep his club in the game. NCFC created several chances as extra time ticked away but it wasn’t enough. North Carolina suffered their first home loss of the season.
Sarachan reflected on the feeling of letting a point slip away. “I haven’t met with the group yet, but I’m sure they’re gonna feel gutted,” he said. “I feel gutted because, if nothing else, you come out of here with something, given the adjustments and given the way they played.”
“If we want to be in the top four or five in this league—which I think we can—we’ve gotta do better in games like this,” Sarachan said. “So I think we take a lot of the positives, and look at some of the negatives, and hopefully get better from it.”
Final Notes
- North Carolina acquired young forward Justin Rennicks on loan from the New England Revolution earlier this week. Rennicks saw some time in the game when he came on for Nazmi Albadawi in the 83rd minute.
- Assistant coach Juan Guerra was at the helm for Indy after head coach Martin Rennie picked up a red card in their loss at Nashville.
- North Carolina FC’s loss, coupled with a win for Nashville SC, dropped them into fifth place in the eastern conference.
- Manny Perez was back in the lineup after nursing a lengthy ankle injury. He was in the starting eleven for Dave Sarachan but made way for Graham Smith at halftime.
- Saturday evening’s game ended up being the second of a doubleheader. The North Carolina Courage game against the Washington Spirit, originally scheduled for Friday night, was postponed after a prolonged storm stalled over Cary. The two sides took the field at 4:00 p.m. for the first game of the afternoon.
- Next up for North Carolina FC is a trip to Memphis on August 10 and a two-game home stand against Pittsburgh and Tampa Bay later this month.
Lineups
North Carolina FC: A. Tambakis; S. Brotherton, V. Igbekoyi, DJ Taylor, A. Guillen ©; M. Perez (G. Smith 45’), D. Fortune, B. Speas, Y. Chester (R. Kristo 89’), N. Albadawi (J. Rennicks 83’); D. Ewolo
Indy Eleven: E. Newton; L. Farias, P. Barrett, K. Ouimette, N. Hackshaw; A. Garcia, M. Watson © (I. Ilic 80’), T. Gibson, K. Walker (M. King 90+5), T. Pasher; D. Kelly (T. Enevoldsen 81’)
Score:
North Carolina FC: 1
Indy Eleven: 2
Goals:
North Carolina FC: D. Fortune (69’ Guillen)
Indy Eleven: M. Watson (15’ Pasher); I. Ilic (87’ Gibson)
Discipline North Carolina FC: A. Guillen, YC, 27’; N. Albadawi, YC, 43’; B. Speas, YC, 90+4
Indy Eleven: P. Barrett, YC, 84’
Attendance: 4,393
Photo gallery: North Carolina FC v Indy Eleven
All photos by Victoria Klum
