Indy Eleven vs Louisville City - 11.05

Summary

- Opponent: Louisville City FC
- Location: Lynn Family Stadium
- Attendance: 11,330
- Final Score: 5-3 L

- Starting XI: Oettl, Boudadi, Diz Pe, O'Brien, J., Barbir, Stanley, Schneider, Blake, Lindley (C), Williams, Martinez, Guenzatti

- Substitution: Gibson 62' (Schneider); Ikoba 62' (Williams); Collier 79' (Guenzatti)

- Unused: Sulte, Barbir, King, Wootton

- Scoring Summary:
LOU -  16' Harris (assist Morris)
IND - 34' Blake (Penalty Kick)
LOU - 41' Wilson (assist Harris)
LOU - 50' Wynder (assist Serrano)
IND - 59' Blake (assist Guenzatti)
LOU - 62' Harris (assist Perez)
LOU - 71' Harris (assist Serrano)
IND - 82' Own Goal (McCabe)

- Bookings:

IND - Martinez 32' (Yellow)
IND - Boudadi 40' (Yellow)
IND - Oettl 71' (Yellow)
LOU - Las 77' (Yellow)
LOU - Serrano 87' (Yellow)
LOU - Gonzales 90'+6' (Yellow)

- Referee: Jeremy Scheer

- Adage goals: Three

Thoughts and Opinions

Louisville-Indianapolis Proximity Football Contest

Columbia Broadcasting System

LIPAFC on CBS

The USL Championship made its national television debut with Indy Eleven and Louisville City FC in a game with one of the longest rivalry names in probably all of soccer. Both teams have players who have played on both sides of the rivalry with, amazingly to me, both starting the game on the bench. Tyler Gibson has been a mainstay in the midfield of both teams and Dylan Mares made a stop in El Paso between his time in Indy and his time now in Louisville. Louisville has started their season in much the same way that Louisville has started most of their seasons. Louisville came into the game undefeated, with three wins and a +8 goal differential. Indy has had inconsistent results in their first four games with a 1W-1D-2L record and a -1 GD.

It took just over 15 minutes for Louisville to cash in on the pressure that they were putting on Indy, showing the two different forms the teams are in for the early part of the season. It took just under another 15 minutes for Louisville to nearly double that advantage when Davila rocketed a ball off Oettl's right post before closing the entire goal and finding Stanley for a clearance.

The first thirty minutes was all Louisville. Just after the 30-minute mark, though, Indy found a way into the game as Boudadi attacked up the wings and found himself clipped inside the box for an awarded penalty kick. Indy's surprising offensive threat this season, Jack Blake, stepped up and put the firmly down the middle of the goal as Las dove to his left. It was against the run of play, but Indy needed it.

Then they threw it right back away because Indy had no answer for Wilson Harris. Harris found another ball up the left side of the field, and placed a ball through the center of the 18-yard box, where an on-rushing Wilson found the ball coming right to him and calmly slotted his first goal of his career over a late-arriving Stanley and out of the reach of a diving Oettl. The teams finished the half with a deserved lead for Louisville. Going into the locker room, Louisville had to feel like they left goals on the field and Indy had to be scratching their head on how the hell they were going to slow down Harris, who was running rampant against one of Indy's best defenders in Boudadi.

What happened after halftime was that Louisville put their foot on Indy's throat and scored a third goal within 5-minutes of the second stanza's whistle. I don't want to say that it was over at that point, but it kind of was semantics at that point. Indy found another goal through Blake in the 59th minute and then promptly gave it right back in the 62nd minute. Harris added another one 9-minutes later for good measure. Indy found a third goal in the 82nd from a Niall McCabe own goal to help with the goal differential. With 10 minutes worth of stoppage time that gave both teams opportunities to add to the EIGHT goal outing, both teams looked like they were tired as shots drifted wide and the game mercifully came to an end for Eleven fans. 

Indy returns to Carroll Stadium next weekend to play Charleston, with questions to answer on how they're going to get their next victory against yet another top of the table team.

The Game Beckons Game Ball

Another game where his ability to score is the only thing that kept this game close for Indy. In the loss, Blake continues to show that he is unafraid to take shots at goal, and is finding the back of it frequently. The GBGB once again goes to Blake.

Indy Eleven vs Louisville City - 10.21

Summary

- Opponent: Louisville City FC
- Location: Lynn Family Stadium
- Attendance: 13,248
- Final Score: 2-0 L

- Starting XI: Oettl, King, Chapman-Page, Diz Pe, Dambrot, Blake, Quinn, Velasquez, Martinez, Pinho, Guenzatti (C)

- Substitution: Boudadi 58; (Pinho); Jerome 58' (Chapman-Page); Robledo 70' (Dambrot); Asante 70' (Velasquez); Molina 85' (Blake)

- Unused: Trilk, Sanchez

- Scoring Summary:
LOU - Wynder 28' (assist Jimenez)
LOU - Lancaster 65' (assist Jimenez)

- Bookings:

IND - Dambrot 58’ (Yellow)
IND - Quinn 68' (Yellow)
IND - Diz Pe 86' (Yellow)
IND - Boudadi 90'+4' (Yellow)

- Referee: Ricardo Fierro

- Adage goals: None

Thoughts and Opinions

In the preceding three games before tonight's LIPAFC matchup between Indy and Louisville, Indy played Charleston (3rd in the table at the time), Tampa Bay (3rd in the table at the time), and Pittsburgh (1st in the table at the time), and have come out of stretch with one win and two draws, and a +2 goal differential. In the preceding three games before tonight's matchup, Louisville played Pittsburgh, Detroit, and Birmingham, and have come out of that stretch with zero wins, zero draws, and three losses with a -4 GD. Indy has been firmly rooted to 7th place in the table until recently where they dropped below the playoff line, but have found their way back above it with their recent run of form, while Louisville have made a steady decline down the table due to their form and came into this game in6th place. Louisville's three-game losing streak has happened just once in their club's history in league play, all the way back in their inaugural season in 2015. 

These were two teams coming into a rivalry game in completely different forms. 

 

Indy/Louisville started at the same time as the El Paso/RGV game. Within the first 20 minutes, Indy/Louisville was 0-0 with 3 shots (none on target and all by Louisville), while the ELP/RGV game was 2-2 with 11 shots (8 on target). To say that the IND/LOU game was a game between more defensive-minded teams is an understatement. Both teams are in the top of the league in goals conceded (5th and 8th best for Indy and Louisville, respectively), while also being at the bottom of the league in goals scored (19th for IND and second to last for LOU).

First Half Heat Map, nearly all in Indy's defensive half

Yet despite LOU's inability to score (amazingly, one of two of the top team's in the Eastern Conference with a negative goal differential on the season), it was LOU that found the first goal of the game. Indy held a 70/30 possession advantage at the time of the goal, but it was nearly all within Indy's defensive half of the field. Indy didn't get their first, and only, shot in the half until the 37th minute. The first half looked much like the early part of the season for Indy where they maintained possession, but couldn't do much with it. Another lapse in defending on Wynder put LOU ahead at the break. The two teams combined for a single shot on goal, though LOU put a free kick that doesn't count as an official shot on goal, but ricocheted off the crossbar indicating it was clearly a shot ON goal. If you were looking for high flying soccer, you should probably have been watching the ELP/RGV game that finished the first half at 3-2 with 17 shots (10 on target) and finished the game at 5-2 with 23 shots (13 on target). By contrast, this game had 21 shots (14 to 7 in favor of LOU) with 5 on target (all by LOU). While the Western Conference game was high octane, this game was a grind that LOU out-grinded.

Photo: David Mucker

Indy love to play out of the back with Lowry calling Oettl the best all-around goalkeeper in the USL. With consistent pressure from perpetual pain-in-the-asses Ownby and Lancaster, Indy nearly paid for their inflexible desire to play out of the back through the LOU's forward's pressure on the ball. In a clear example of a desire to "play our game," it's also a complete refusal to consider that how you play every team shouldn't be the same way. Ownby's and Lancaster's pressing is on a different level than many teams and nearly cost Indy a couple of times including the chance captured by a Louisville photographer when Ownby's effort nearly took the ball directly off of Oettl's foot. Indy's defenders are seem so comfortable with Oettl's ability with the ball at his feet that they often put him in situations where things could go sideways really easily, particularly with a player like Ownby. 

In the end, it was the Wynder goal in the first half and a corner kick header from Lancaster that brought Indy's 3-game uptick in results to a screeching halt in a 2-nil loss. The loss also meant that The Barrel remained in Louisville after winning the season series of the LIPAFC.

This game looked like the kind of game that exemplifies "how" Indy wants to play; with possession and in control of the tempo of the game. However, this game also exemplifies that Indy can't consistently create any chances from all the possession. There just isn't a constant ability to convert all of the possession, touches, and passes into legitimate shots, and definitely not legitimate shots on goal. Despite Indy having so much of the ball, there were really only a few times during the game when I thought they might turn it into chances on goal. There were even fewer moments when I thought that Indy was going to come away from this game with a win. The two teams looked like they were completely flipped on who was in the better form coming into this game.

Given the 3 games in 8 days situation for Indy against the top teams in the league, the fact that this was the only loss of the week is impressive. Even with the loss, Indy continue to hover around the playoff cut line with games in hand. Memphis comes to The Mike next weekend, in their own stretch of rough results, with a 0W-2D-4L record in their last six games. Regardless of Memphis' form, Indy are going have to find a way to create more chances to score than they did tonight or they're going to see a similar result as they saw in Louisville.

The Game Beckons Game Ball

I know I've done this more times this year than I have in the past, but as I think about this game, there isn't a single player that stands out to me as having an exceptionally good game, even in the loss. The closest I can come is Oettl's save on Totsch shortly after Louisville's second goal that would have made it 3-nil. That's about it, and I don't think that is worthy enough to be given the GBGB. So once again, we're going to forego awarding it tonight.

The (Mini) Barrel - Auction for Charity

Last year, the Louisville-Indianapolis Proximity Association Football Contest (LIPAFC) took another step in its lore when Matt (@LouCitySting) took the time to physically create a trophy for the competition that had just been an idea between supporters. I think it is now considered an "official" trophy between the two teams and is awarded to the team that wins that year's series between Indy Eleven and Louisville City FC. Named simply The Barrel (TM), the trophy recognizes the constant construction traffic that separates the two cities, and currently resides in Indianapolis. The last I saw of it, it was sitting in the house of current Brickyard Battalion President Katherine Reed.

In October, I decided to take Matt's inspiration and scale The Barrel down to something that didn't take a corner of my house like it does in Katherine's, and created a 1:10 scale version of the trophy using a 3-D printed barrel, some high resolution printing, and my first attempt at weathering the barrel without actually destroying it. Since it was made of 3-D printed material, I couldn't dent it to look like the full-scale version, but I thought it turned out well enough that I decided to share my scaled version of the Barrel on Twitter. Luckily for my ego, The (Mini) Barrel was well received, with several people either suggesting I could sell them, or that I should sell them. I never made it to make money, but was happy that people liked my version of The Barrel. 

However, one of the comments for that Twitter post came from the Brickyard Battalion and suggested selling them and donating the money, which caught my attention. I don't have a ton of desire to take a bunch of 1:10 scale models of traffic cones, weather them, and sell them, no matter how much I might make from them, from a fairly small demographic (Indy Eleven or Louisville City fans, wanting to have a version of the trophy in their home...). I kept coming back to the idea though, of creating a LIMITED amount of The (Mini) Barrels, auctioning them, and donating ALL THE PROCEEDS to charity. 

So that's what I've done. 

If you've ever looked at my answers to my Soccer Life questionnaire, or my Twitter account, I have always associated my soccer career with the #6, so I decided to create SIX versions of my original (Mini) Barrel and will be auctioning them leading up to this year's first LIPAFC contest on May 27th. Bids will close at 11:59 PM of the Thursday before the game (May 25th) and bids will be received by commenting to this post with your bid and preferred barrel so that everybody can keep track of the latest bids. Winners will be notified on Friday (May 26th) via this post and by a Twitter post by me. If you're going to be at the LIPAFC game on the 27th (or know somebody who will and can get yours to you), I will hand deliver your winning (Mini) Barrel to you. If I need to ship your (Mini) Barrel to you, I would ask that you pay for the shipping. Winning payments can be via cash in person or via Venmo (details upon winning).

Again, ALL PROCEEDS will be donated to charity, and I have selected The Julian Center in Indianapolis as the recipient of the donation. The Julian Center "was founded in 1975 to support survivors of domestic and sexual violence throughout Indiana and empower them to recover and build a life for themselves and their families absent of abuse." Every cent from each of The (Mini) Barrels will be donated to this organization.

I would like to request that bids for each (Mini) Barrel start at $30. If bids reach $60, I will include a scarf to add to your winnings (I do have one Louisville Racing scarf, and one Louisville City scarf with the short-lived failed logo change from 2019 if you happen to be an auction winner from Louisville and don't want an Indy scarf, which you can see in the photo to the right). If bids reach $100, I'll transfer two tickets to you for any future Indy Eleven game this season.

The (Mini) Barrels:

• Come with a black stand (which you can see in the photos), but the barrels can stand on their own without the stand.
  
• Have a label indicating that it was part of a LIMITED EDITION SET of 6.
• Resemble each other, but are not exact duplicates, as I'm a human being and not a machine.

Below is a photo of each of The (Mini) Barrels being auctioned