Both the Fire and Red Stars managed to not lose at home this past Saturday. However, both have work to do to continue to not lose games and turn their seasons around.
FIRE: Arguably, it took a howler for the Fire to finally notch a win in 2021, but they were the better team against Inter Miami. You make your own luck in soccer, and the Fire finally had it as Luka Stojanovic’s free kick was bobbled over the line by John McCarthy. The Fire were also on song defensively as they limited the Herons to just one shot on target (and four shots overall).
Now the challenge is to build a winning streak and that starts next Saturday against CF Montreal (who lost to FC Cincinnati) and Djordje Mihailovic who has been Montreal’s best player so far this season. A loss here and the inquests will come back in full force.
FRANKOWSKI GETS POLAND CALLUP: Fire midfielder Przemyslaw Frankowski will represent Poland at Euro 2020. Frankowski has earned 10 caps for Poland, including six appearances (two starts) in UEFA Euro 2020 qualifying. The midfielder’s first career goal for the senior team occurred in Poland’s Euro 2020 qualifying match against North Macedonia on October 13th, 2019. Moments after entering the game, Frankowski scored to give Poland a 1-0 lead and helped guide the team to a 2-0 victory and clinching a spot at Euro 2020.
Poland are in Group E and will begin their EURO 2020 campaign against Slovakia on Monday, June 14th at 11:00 am CT in St. Petersburg, Russia. The team will then travel to Seville, Spain, to face Spain on 2:00pm CT on Saturday, June 19th. And then they will head back to St. Petersburg for the final match of Group E play, facing Sweden at 11:00am CT on Wednesday, June 23rd.
Frankowski will join the squad after the May 29th match against Montreal.
RED STARS: It was refreshing to see fans at a Red Stars match (3,123 of them) and who knows how many more if the Fire had not been playing a couple hours earlier. Now they need to finish their chances. Given time–and full health–Mallory Pugh, Rachel Hill, and Kealia Watt can be one of the most dangerous attacking trios in the league. Right now, Pugh needs to get back to full fitness, Watt needs to regain her form, and Hill needs to do a little of both.
ANTHEM ISSUES: Before the match, just four of the Red Stars starting XI–Alyssa Naeher, Kayla Sharples, Tierna Davidson, and Sarah Gorden–appeared for the anthem and all but Naeher took a knee. All of Gotham FC’s starters were present and all but captain Carli Lloyd kneeled.
The Red Stars did not play the anthem for either home game during the NWSL Challenge Cup and did not appear during the anthem for the match against Portland as a protest after a video the NWSL published in April promoting a documentary on the 2020 Challenge Cup in Utah. In it was a clip of an emotional embrace between Casey Krueger and Julie Ertz during the anthem ahead of the team’s match against the Washington Spirit.
“I think ultimately, it’s like a game-by-game thing,” said Gorden after Saturday’s match. “It depends on how Casey (Kreuger) feels in the moment and what support she needs. For me, I wanted to be out there. It’s our first home game in front of our fans. My son and my boyfriend are in the crowd and it was really important for me to be able to go out there to take it in today, but ultimately depends on the game and how each player is feeling.”
Local 134 distributed shirts that said, “Believe Support Protect Black People,” a response to the NWSL’s investigation into an incident of alleged racial profiling against defender Sarah Gorden after a game in Houston. No discipline was issued against Houston in the incident.
