Indy Eleven vs Racing Louisville - 05.04

Summary

- Opponent: Racing Louisville
- Location: Lynn Family Vision & Training Center
- Attendance: -
- Final Score: 1-0 L

- Starting XI: Reason, Brecht, Mills, Adam, Lee, Smith (C), Johnson, Dardano, Boyd, Guthrie, Jodoin

- Substitution: Satterfield 45' (Lee); Hamm 58' (Boyd); Sochacki 62' (Guthrie); Chong 62' (Dardano); Kikuchi 80' (Johnson); Kruer 80' (Adam)

- Unused: Edwards

- Scoring Summary:
LOU - Stiefvater 61' (assist)

- Bookings:

LOU - Snyder 45' (Yellow)

- Referee: ?

Thoughts and Opinions

I was worried this season might go this way for me at times. Another game where I'm unable to provide much commentary as my family life takes precedence and more important things were happening. As a result, I watched a majority of this game from my phone. It wasn't until the very end that I was able to switch to my laptop screen. Yes, I could rewatch as my days settled down, but that hasn't really happened. Additionally, much like the Dayton stream from the last game, the Racing Louisville stream just barely qualifies as being a stream at all and I really don't want to watch it again. For an organization that seems to do so much well for the men's team and the women's NWSL team, they really seem to not care about how "professional" their preprofessional team social media and streaming looks. Just one of those high elevation cameras to provide wide angle shots and no commentary to help with players... As such, I'm sure you can imagine how ineffective it was to watch the game on a phone. As a result, and similar to the Dayton game, this isn't going to be my best discussion. Sorry, ladies.

Best I could tell from what I was able to watch and what I could see, Indy controlled significant portions of the game and had the better attacks. They just couldn't get the ball in the goal. As the Indy men's team has shown this year, possession statistics don't necessarily mean much, but rather where your possession occurs and what you do with it. Indy had enough possession in Racing's half of the field and in dangerous positions, but couldn't get a goal. Do that for long enough, and eventually the opponent is going to get their own chances, which Racing did and managed to find a goal to give them the lead and the eventual winner. 

Indy have now dropped two straight games, have been held scoreless in both, and really need a good result out of their upcoming game midweek against Toledo who sit at the bottom of the Valley Division, before finally coming back home to finish the season with a four-game homestand. I'm sure there had to be some kind of logic to their scheduling, but getting just one home game and four away games in the month of May may have put them behind the 8-ball without much chance to finishing strong enough to win the division. With so few teams in the division, every game now feels like a proverbial 6-pointer, but they definitely need to get a win against Toledo on Wednesday to springboard them into the final stretch.