Indy Eleven vs Tampa Bay Rowdies - 12.17

Summary

- Opponent: Tampa Bay Rowdies
- Location: Carroll Stadium
- Attendance: 9,107
- Final Score: 3-1 L

- Starting XI: Sulte, O'feimu, Musa, O'Brien, J., Rendon, Lindley, Murphy, Quinn (C), Blake, Williams, R., Foster

- Substitution: Hogan 45' (O'Brien, J.); Collier 60' (Blake); Bryneus 78' (Lindley); Kizza 78' (Musa)

- Unused: Charles-Cook, Amoh, Soumaoro 

Scoring Summary:
TBR - Pacius 2' (assist Moon)
IND - Ofeimu 44' (assist Murphy)
TBR - Alvarez 57' (assist Pacius)

- Bookings:

TBR - Moon 38' (Yellow)
TBR - Pacius 73' (Yellow)
IND - Musa 75' (Yellow)
IND - Murphy 80' (Yellow)

- Referee: Abdou Ndiaye

- Adage goals: One.

Thoughts and Opinions

First things first. Congratulations to Cam Lindley for joining a very elite group of Indy Eleven players. Cam becomes just the 5th player in team history to reach 100 caps for the club, joining Ayoze, Ring, Quimette, and Smart. Cam's first game for Indy was a 2-1 win on July 18, 2020 against Sporting Kansas City II. Notable for that game was that Ouimette and Ayoze both played, and Nick Moon who now plays for tonight's opponent Tampa Bay, all played alongside Lindley that night in Lucas Oil Stadium.

Do you want the bad news? Indy and Tampa Bay have been playing each other since the NASL days and Indy has a 3W-7L-10D record against the team from Florida. Want more bad news? Indy hasn't beaten Tampa Bay in 9 games (5 losses, 4 draws), with the last Indy victory coming in 2018. Want even more bad news, Indy added to that list of poor results again tonight in a 3-1 lose to extend that streak to 10 games.

Tampa Bay went ahead in the12th minute as Moon and Pacius one-touched their way around the Indy defense. Quinn, in his new wing back role, was charged with marking Moon, who has more pace than Quinn. Quinn has a high soccer IQ, but Moon's pace put him behind Quinn, setting up the close quarters interplay between Moon and Pacius. While the goal was early, it had been coming due to Tampa Bay holding the possession and stifling all of Indy's attacks.

Just before the 30 minute mark, O'Brien had a rare foray into the Tampa Bay offensive third of the field and was bailed out by an TBR defender, setting up a free kick from around 30-yards away from the goal. The ensuing free kick from Quinn set off a string of attempts by the home squad, but nothing that made its way through the green jerseys to force a save from Bandre. The sustained effort from Indy didn't result in a save attempt or a goal, but the 5 bites of the apple were good to see out of the team. 

Photo: Don Thompson Photography

Indy found an equalizer from a corner kick just before halftime to go into the locker room with a better opinion of the half. What started as a short corner was given right back to Murphy and put in a cross to the 6-yard box from a better angle. Ofeimu rose above and headed the ball back the other direction away from Bandre who couldn't stop his momentum enough to get a hand on the ball. All the action after the corner kick started because Quinn received the ball in his half of the field. Something I've noticed he does frequently is to pop the ball up slightly with his back to the opponent's goal and then blasts the ball with his left foot up the line. Foster saw it coming and immediately started running up the line as well. By the time his defender realized where the ball was going, Foster was already chasing down the ball. The defender recovered enough to force the corner kick, but the direct play from Quinn and the anticipation from Foster set up the chance.

Indy's effort to get back into the game was upended through some more direct play through the center of the field by Tampa Bay and Alvarez found the left side of the goal as Sulte was sliding to his right. Earlier in the game, Romario Williams pushed his shot just barely wide of the same post and Alvarez bounced his shot off the post to push Tampa Bay back into the lead. With the lead, the game became a bit discombobulated as neither team could hold possession and Tampa Bay was in no hurry for restarts.

Down a goal and time running out, Coach McAuley signaled his intent to go for the equalizer as he subbed out Musa for Kizza. When that happened, Indy had Kizza, Foster, Collier, and Williams all on the field at the same time. That's a coach that was opening himself for Tampa Bay to find a third due to not having bodies in the back, but you can't fault him for the effort on attack. As the time ran out, Tampa Bay did exactly that, and found a third goal in the 90'+8' minute. The goal didn't do anything but change the goal differential and the Indy defense's frustration with conceding a third goal, but it once again showed that Coach McAuley is going to go for wins at home, even knowing that the third goal might happen. 

Indy might have deserved a bit more out of the game than a 3-1 loss, but the inconsistent, up-and-down season continues. The good news is that based on recent trends, Indy should win the next two games. Unfortunately, those next two games are on the road, which differs from much of their recent stretch of home games. 

The 2025 season has transitioned to the back half of the season, but it has no appearance of transitioning to a season where Indy isn't flirting with the playoff line. Indy's Summer of Soccer was filled with home games, but Indy's back half of the season is filled with away games, and games against the top of the Eastern Conference. Indy's path to a playoff game looks littered with more results like tonight's interspersed with enough wins to keep them in contention. Whether that will be enough as the season ends to actually be in the playoffs looks debatable at the moment, but I don't foresee any of these players nor Coach giving up until the season is over.

Indy head to Detroit next weekend.

The Game Beckons Game Ball

Thinking about the game, it feels like one of those games where no single player stood out either offensively or defensively. There wasn't a player that took the game by the scruff of the neck and tried to carry the rest of the team over the line. As a result, it feels like, despite the team conceding 3 goals, a bit weird to give a defender the GBGB, but Ofeimu put himself in really good position to get the Indy goal and took. He said after the game that Murphy's deliver was so good that he didn't have to do much, but that's taking away from his own ability to beat his man to the ball. He might have just needed to get a head to it to redirect it, but he had to put himself in that position to do so. Ofeimu, as a defender getting a goal, gets tonight's edge for the GBGB.

Photos: Don Thompson Photography

Indy Eleven vs Tampa Bay Rowdies - 12.13

Summary

- Opponent: Tampa Bay Rowdies
- Location: Al Lang Stadium
- Attendance: 3,692
- Final Score: 3-1 L

- Starting XI: Sulte, Bryneus, McRobb, Ofeimu, O'Brien, J., Rendon, Quinn (C), Blake, Soumaoro, Kizza, Foster

- Substitution: Murphy 29' (Soumaoro - injury); Hogan 32' (Ofeimu - injury); White 70' (Rendon); Amoh 70' (Kizza); Lindley 70' (Bryneus)

- Unused: Charles-Cook, Collier

Scoring Summary:
IND - Foster 45'+1' (assist Blake)
TBR - Bodily 60' (unassisted)
TBR - Moon 69' (assist Alvarez)
TBR - Wyke 90'+3' (assist Bassett)

- Bookings:

IND - Kizza 43' (Yellow)
IND - Rendon 45'+4' (Yellow)
TBR - Guillen 55' (Yellow)
IND - Foster 66' (Yellow)
IND - Hogan 68' (Yellow)
TBR - Arteaga 73' (Yellow)
IND - Lindley 82' (Yellow)
TBR - Pacius 90'+5' (Yellow)

- Referee: Jeremy Scheer

- Adage goals: One.

Thoughts and Opinions

Nothing like weather delay to force me to watch part of a Loudoun/Louisville game while I wait out the delay. Loudoun had a player get a red card in the 45'+1' and then their coach was shown an early exit in the 58th minute. Want to guess how that one finished? I think this was the 14th time these two teams played each other this year (technically just the 4th... 2 league games +1 Jagermeister game + 1 USOC game), so at least they tried to keep it interesting with all the ejections and all the goals Louisville scored being up a player.

One hour and 54 minutes. That was the length of the weather delay. A delay that had the ESPN2 feed showing episodes of a documentary called Greenland ("A documentary series about the most unexpected and exotic soccer fields on the planet, impressive for their contrasts, but where playing soccer is not impossible."). The floating field in Thailand looked interesting...and sketchy. Then NFL Live. The other football. Solved a Rubik's Cube. Checked in on the World Series of Poker events. Checked on the Cubs score. I also managed to do a little website housekeeping... In a week where Indy Eleven (the club...men + women) have 6 games in 9 days, a 2-hour weather delay was not what I wanted to see tonight.  

Finally, Indy and Tampa Bay kicked off at 9:02 in the PM.

Indy's schedule of Las Vegas last Saturday night, Tampa Bay tonight, and at home against Birmingham in the Jagermeister Cup meant that Coach McAuley had some squad rotation tonight. The rotation might help the overall energy levels of the players (the weather delay is going to mess with that though), but there were some guys playing together at the start that haven't been playing together for such a long duration. As a result, Indy looked discombobulated early as they tried to get their legs under them and used to the way the soggy field was playing. Tampa Bay managed a couple of shots in those early minutes, including one off the woodwork, but Indy began to find some rhythm as the settled down. Then the injuries starting piling up with Coach McAuley having to burn two of his substitution windows within a 3-minute stretch as both Soumaoro and Ofeimu had to be replaced because of injuries. Whatever rotation McAuley planned, 30-minutes into the game, that plan was upended. 

Indy began to tilt the field in their favor as the half wore down until Foster received a ball 25-yards away from goal, took a touch to his left, and sent an absolute rocket into the upper 90 well out of reach of Bandre. A 1-nil lead on the road going into the locker room, having already burned two substitutes, history indicated that a McAuley bunker looked imminent once the teams returned to the field in the second half. A penalty kick awarded to Tampa Bay minutes into the half looked like the game was going to take yet another turn. It turned out to be a strange turn, when Artega stepped up to the ball and proceeded to blast the ball well over the crossbar into the humid St. Petersburg night allowing Indy to maintain their lead. 

Within 7 minutes of the miss, TBR countered through Bodily where he outran the entire Indy midfield. Much like the other night against Las Vegas, Bodily got the ball to Arteaga and when the ball was deflected off of Arteaga, back to Bodily who had been left completely alone. One touch and his shot was passed back across the goal and tucked nicely inside the post. One goal became two when Indy's former player, Nick Moon, did what he saw him do here. He picked up the ball and attacked the Indy goal. When he found just enough of a window for a shot, he took it. The shot took a deflection on its way through towards goal and a flailing trailing leg from Sulte couldn't make contact with the ball and the Rowdies had clawed their way back for the lead. 

Indy immediately made a few substitutions for fresh legs, but it wasn't enough as Tampa Bay held onto the lead for the final 21'+6'. A soggy, weather delayed slugfest was solidified in nearly Las Vegas fashion on a counter when Indy didn't track all the attackers and an unmarked Wyke pushed the ball easily passed Sulte for the 3-1 win. 

Mike Watts commented that Indy fans will comment that the Eleven lost to the what was the last place team in the conference, but that "would be reductive." Maybe. Indy has scored the opening goal in 9 of their 13 league games. In those 9 games, Indy has 3 wins and 4 draws. So positive results in 7 of the 9. However, in 3 of those draws, Indy conceded late or in stoppage time to lose 2 points per game. If Indy had those 6 extra points as wins instead of draws, Indy would be sitting at 20 points, tied for the 5th spot. If Indy wants to prove they belong up there, and I'm nearly reaching the point when I'm not sure they do, then they have to beat the teams that are struggling even more than they are, and that was a Tampa Bay team. Reductive or not, Indy should have been able to win this game. Much like the women last night, they didn't match the intensity of their opponent for the full ninety and the opposition had a better half than Indy's better half.

Indy return to The Mike on Saturday to face Birmingham as part of the Jagermeister Cup. A win likely clinches the group and puts Indy into the knockout round of the tournament. Indy already beat Birmingham once this season when Lindley scored a 4th minute goal and then basically bunkered for the next 86 minutes. McAuley values Cup competitions, but I'm losing faith in this group getting wins. Guess we'll find out on Saturday.

The Game Beckons Game Ball

This is my fourth game writeup since last Friday. In that time, I have watched and discussed four Indy Eleven club losses. The Women lost to Lexington 4-nil on Friday. The Men lost to Las Vegas 1-nil on Saturday. The Women lost to Louisville 2-1 yesterday. The Men lost to Tampa Bay 3-1 tonight. Let's go with I'm tired and I don't have it in me to really give this award. If pushed, I would give it to Foster purely for the likely Goal of the Week nominee for his 1st half stoppage time goal. Yeah, let's go with that.

Indy Eleven vs Tampa Bay Rowdies - 11.34

Summary

- Opponent: Tampa Bay Rowdies
- Location: IMG Academy Soccer Stadium
- Attendance: 496
- Final Score: 3-0 L

- Starting XI: Sulte, Neidlinger, Chapman-Page, Diz Pe, Mines, White, Lindley (C), Guenzatti, Wootton, Williams, R., Collier

- Substitution: O'Brien, J. 62' (White); Martinez 68' (Collier); Williams, A. 68' (Williams, R.); Martinez 68' (Neidlinger)

- Unused: Oettl, Ofeimu, Soumaoro

Scoring Summary:
TBR - Arteaga 9' (Penalty Kick)
TBR - Crisostomo 25' (assist Bodily)
TBR - Jennings 63' (assist Fernandes)

- Bookings:

TBR - Hilton 50' (Yellow)
IND - Chapman-Page 52' (Yellow)
TBR - Munjoma 73' (Yellow)
TBR - Worth 90'+2' (Yellow)

- Referee: Calin Radosav

- Adage goals: None

Thoughts and Opinions

Another week and another starting lineup. Only two players remained in the starting lineup from the last game against Birmingham (Sulte & Neidlinger), while the remaining 9 spots were filled by some players who either came in as substitutes or weren't even on the game roster (Lindley & Guezatti). The depth of Indy's squad this year allows for McAuley to make game-by-game decisions to put out the team that he thinks is best for the game, but also to manage legs and minutes. 

It was two former Indy Eleven players though that got the scoring started. Nick Moon took on Mines, then took on Diz Pe, and the two combined to bring Moon to the ground inside the box. Manuel Arteaga stepped up, sent Sulte to the goalkeeper's right, but calmly put the ball to Sulte's left. Indy came into the game with a chance to get to the 3rd position in the table with a win and a Detroit loss, but they put themselves down early to make that an uphill battle. Conceding the 2nd goal in the 25th minute was also well deserved as Bodily and Crisostomo worked their way around and through the Indy defenders. 

Indy, in the early minutes, were chasing shadows as the Rowdies moved the ball around nicely. Probably more impressive than their effort going forward was their defensive effort as they consistently pressed the ball whenever they lost it, giving Indy very little time to make any decisions or plays. The Rowdies were collectively in sync with each other defensively, and Indy had very little answer to get around, or even over, the TBR defensive line. As the game crept towards the halftime whistle, Indy began to have moments of possession, but as we've seen this year, possession in dangerous areas is more important than just possession and Indy weren't in dangerous areas with their possession. 

The two-goal deficit also sent McAuley into tinkering mode, with the midfielders constantly interchanging positions. Neidlinger, who started on the right side of the field, was seen moving into the middle of the field and even onto the left side. McAuley has indicated before that he wanted to get minutes for Neidlinger in the middle of the field to see how he would handle the pressure with guys coming at him from all angles. It looked like with very little to play for, McAuley was giving the young player another chance at learning that part of the game. As a result, White also started pushing more forward, leaving Lindley as the lone holding midfielder. Indy needed to figure out what was working, or could work, because the majority of the first 45 minutes was not a good display for Indy. 

With this Indy team, paying attention to most of the major statistical categories can mean almost nothing as to how a game is actually progressing. Tonight, though, TBR dominated the stats AND were the better team. Once Tampa Bay scored their third, all that was left was for the clock to run out. Oh, McAuley and Indy brought on attacking subs, but the game was never in doubt and Indy finished the regular season with a loss on the road.

The good news for Indy was that the home playoff game was never in doubt, no matter the result. If you were like me and were keeping one eye on the live standings, the spots below Indy bounced around quite a bit as scores moved the #5 - #10 teams around. Indy stayed firmly planted at the #4 spot. While the potential to get to the #3 spot was possible, it was also never in just their hands as they were going to need a losing performance from Detroit. Many times throughout this season, the statement was made that every point mattered. That was most prominently stated with the late late goal against Pittsburgh, when a 10-man Riverhounds team held on until the 90'+7' goal from Romario Williams. Looking at just that single result, without the goal and the subsequent draw, Indy, Tampa Bay, and Pittsburgh would have all finished on 50 points. As a result, Rhode Island would have moved to 4th place, Tampa Bay would have moved to 5th place, and thanks to the 3rd tiebreaker, Pittsburgh would have finished in 6th place if I did my math correctly. If it had not been for that late equalizer by Romario, Indy would be headed back to Charleston in their opening game of the playoffs. Obviously, that might have adjusted how Indy played this game, but that late stoppage time goal proved to be important.

What was a bit disheartening (from a table perspective) from this game was that the 3-goal deficit took Indy's season goal differential to -1. Indy are the only Eastern Conference playoff team with a negative goal differential. Indy's season can be directly traced to their ability to score goals. Obviously, that seems intuitive, but to be able to go 34 games and cumulatively draw all your opponents and still finish in the 4th spot on the table says a lot about the weirdness of this game. The fact that Western Conference winners New Mexico United basically did the same thing may be even crazier. 

It's difficult to call tonight's starting lineup as a "B" roster because all of tonight's starters have starter minutes. However, due to injuries, Guenzatti hadn't played for 6 games, Chapman-Page hadn't played for 10 games, White hadn't played for 4 games, and Diz Pe hadn't played for 2 games. To say these guys weren't at peak condition might be an understatement. More than a third of the starting lineup would normally not have gone more than 60-65 minutes as they worked their way back to full-game health. Three of those four guys played all ninety minutes, with only White coming out due to yet another injury. McAuley knew coming into this game that a result was nice but not vital, and he played a lineup that could get minutes on guy's legs in a non-playoff situation.

With the rest of the night's results, Indy now know they will be playing Rhode Island next Sunday at Carroll Stadium. Indy drew Rhode Island 3-3 at Beirne Stadium in July thanks to a late stoppage goal from RI, while Indy came out ahead 1-nil at Carroll Stadium in August. The next game though will have more on the line as Indy will be looking for their first home & playoff win since 2019, and Rhode Island will be looking for their first playoff win ever in their first season in the USL.

The Game Beckons Game Ball

I don't like not giving a GBGB, but I can't think of a single player's performance that stands out for me as being overly worthy.   

Indy Eleven vs Tampa Bay Rowdies - 11.19

Summary

- Opponent: Tampa Bay Rowdies
- Location: Carroll Stadium
- Attendance: 10,636
- Final Score: 2-0 L

- Starting XI: Sulte, Ofeimu, O'Brien, J., Diz Pe, Martinez, Stanley, Wootton, Lindley (C), Guenzatti, Williams, A., Williams, R.

- Substitution: Collier 65' (Guenzatti); Gibson 65' (Wootton); Mines 65' (Williams, A.); Neidlinger 82' (Ofeimu)

- Unused: Oettl, Chapman-Page, Henderlong, McCoy

- Scoring Summary:
TBR - Jennings 36' (assist Hilton)
TBR - Rivera 80' (unassisted)

- Bookings:

TBR - Crisostomo 13' (Yellow)
IND - Wootton 33' (Yellow)

- Referee: Thomas Snyder

- Adage goals: None

Thoughts and Opinions

This is an opposing goalkeeper
walking through the BYB line. Farr Love!

Indy Eleven South (also known as the Tampa Bay Rowdies) came to town with a number of familiar faces for Indy fans. Fan favorite Jordan Farr is now the netminder in Tampa, while Arteaga started up top for the visitors. If you factor in Nick Moon, who didn't make the trip to Indy, short-term signing Cal Jennings, and Nicky Law who was sitting on the bench as an assistant coach, the number of former players now associated with TBR is staggering. Indy love their former players, but #IndyForever doesn't apply for the 90-minutes of game time. Though, once the game is over, the love returns as Farr was seen walking through the BYB line.

Before I get into the game, I want to mention some player milestones that I neglected to mention after the last game against Loudoun. With his 90-minutes against LDN, Aedan Stanley surpassed the 10,000 regular season mark for his career in the USL. With his appearance in the LDN game, Cam Lindley reached 150 regular season appearances in the league. Elliot Collier has crept within one game of reaching the century mark in the league. If he finds his way onto the field in the upcoming game against Tulsa, he will reach the milestone. Finally, Sebastian Guenzatti is now within 2 games of reaching the 200 game threshold. Congrats to all the guys for their staying power!

Back to our regularly scheduled game article.

Indy first faced TBR early in the inaugural 2014 NASL season, playing to a 1-1 draw. Tonight's match was the 18th meeting between the two teams in the following decade of play, with Indy holding a 3W-4L-10D record against the visitors from Florida coming into the game. Interestingly, at least to me, four of those 18 games have been played in the month of July, with three of them during this weekend of the month. I was surprised to check the record stat and confirm how many times the two teams have played to a draw. The most notable, to me, was the 2-2 draw in June of the 2015 season, that saw a >2 hour rain delay, THREE Tampa Bay players ejected from the game, and a 98th minute banger from Kyle Hyland to salvage the draw. Within hours, Peter Wilt had let Coach Sommer go, moving Tim Regan into the interim coach role. 

This game didn't have the same level of draw, and also didn't end in one of the regular draws between the two teams. The early moments of this game were all within Indy's defensive half of the field as TBR came out pressing hard and pinning Indy back as a result. As the game continued, Indy began to find a bit more possession and forays into TBR's defensive third, but it was still the visitors that were dictating the game until about the 25th minute when Indy began to find more possession and attempts going forward. It was a little before that point where McAuley adjusted his 4-3-3 arrangement to bring Guenzatti back further into the midfield to try and help stabilize the Indy midfield that was being hammered by the TBR attack. Immediately after Lindley had a shot on target that went straight to Farr, TBR went down the field and had their 5th corner of the game. Hilton put the ball to the 6-yard box where Jennings put a flick header to the far netting, giving the visitors a deserved lead in the game going into the halftime locker room.

Full Time Shots

The second half was much like the first half. Both teams found some possession and both had opportunities at goal. The difference was that TBR looked like a better team on the day and found a second goal late in the game by Rivera that, much like the first goal, was deserved. Statistically the teams were fairly similar to each other, not counting the shots (18 to 8 in favor of TBR), shots on target (9 to 2 in favor of TBR), corners (12 to 4 TBR), and (obviously) goals, but TBR's efforts at Indy's goal were greater and much more frequent. 

Sulte had yet another good game, stopping 7 of the shots on target, but really couldn't do much for the two shots that found the net. He couldn't do anything but watch the Jennings flick header, and Rivera's shot on the second goal was so quick and was surrounded by so many Indy defenders that he had to have been surprised to see the ball coming to him. 

If I'm honest, the Indy players looked slower and more tired. They had a reasonable gap between games to get their legs back from their preceeding week, but they didn't look as energetic as they needed to be against an opponent sitting just ahead of them in the table. Indy has 6 players that have started at least 15 of the 19 games and all are averaging more than 75 minutes per game, with Stanley being the minutes leader having played every minute of every league game. All of those players have also started 3 of the 4 U.S. Open Cup games as well. Indy have signed a lot of players this season (36), but 7 have been sent elsewhere, 8 are Academy players, and 2 have been on extended injury leaves, leaving just 19 players to cover the bulk of realistic game minutes. That's a lot of minutes on legs as we get to the midpoint of the league season. Throw in the U.S. Open Cup run, and it's not surprising that some of the player's are starting to show periodic signs of fatigue. That's more an observation than an excuse of tonight's game, but Indy have the talet to compete with a team like Tampa Bay and they didn't do that very well tonight.

Indy return to action next Friday in an interconference clash on the road to FC Tulsa who are sitting on the wrong side of the playoff line in the Western Conference. After Indy's 9-game undefeated streak was broken by Orange County, Indy have not been able to get a win despite three of the four games being played at Carroll Stadium. No games are given in this league, but Indy would like to use the game at ONEOK Field as a "get right" game. 

The Game Beckons Game Ball

While the GBGB typically goes to a player that I keep noticing throughout the game or that has a MVP-type game. However, in the loss, I would like to give tonight's GBGB to Logan Neidlinger, the USL Academy signing who has been training well enough to not only get some looks at being on the bench, but has also found minutes at the end of the past two games. Congrats to the young man who is headed to the University of Indianapolis this fall.

Photographs - Don Thompson Photography

Indy Eleven vs Tampa Bay Rowdies - 10.19

Summary

- Opponent: Tampa Bay Rowdies
- Location: Carroll Stadium
- Attendance: 11,117
- Final Score: 0-0 D

- Starting XI: Oettl, Boudadi, Jerome, King, Quinn, Lindley, Velasquez, Asante, Pinho, Martinez, Guenzatti (C)

- Substitution: Robledo 69’ (Velasquez); Chapman-Page 89’ (Pinho)

- Unused: Trilk, Molina, Sanchez

- Scoring Summary:
NONE

- Bookings:

TBR – Areman 12’ (Yellow)
TBR – Lasso 16’ (Yellow)
IND – Velasquez 27’ (Yellow)

- Referee: Greg Dopka

- Adage goals: None

Thoughts and Opinions

The nightcap for a day at Carroll Stadium after a championship winning game for the women involved the men against the Tampa Bay Rowdies. However the game finished, the men's game was going to be anticlimactic after watching the women defeat the North Carolina Courage U23 by a 2-1 score line thanks to a 99th minute goal by Alia Martin in the first half of extra time. 

Due to the injuries and suspensions, Coach Lowry had to get creative with the starting lineup, with Martinez playing the right wing. Asante, who has been coming off the bench, also found his way into the starting lineup. There wasn’t much depth in this game with only four players on the bench not named Tim Trilk, and one of those four was Callum Chapman-Page who has been in town for just a couple of days, and another was Sanchez, an Academy player who has played a total of 2 minutes all season. It’s a good thing the game was the nightcap and not the afternoon heat that the women had to deal with in their game, because the majority of the starters were going to have to go the full 90-minutes tonight.

Seeing the way the team lined up, and knowing some of Jerome’s mistakes this season, having him and Martinez on the same side next to each other kind of worried me. Much of Tampa Bay’s early advances up the field were coming up the left side of their attack, so they too must have noticed the change. After Tampa Bay’s second yellow in the 16th minute, Lindley dropped back into the defense as Martinez crept forward along the byline. Indy then put a ball long to Martinez that ultimately led to a cross, but nobody was able to latch onto it and it rolled all the way through. That’s the tactical advantage of having a player like Martinez sitting on the back line. His preference is to plow forward with pace and around the defenders.

Early in the game, it seemed like the Indy men wanted to make sure that the women’s team wasn’t the only one with a victory in today’s doubleheader. Indy actually looked to be the better team in the first half, with more shots and shots on target than the Rowdies, but the teams went to the locker room in a nil-nil deadlock. However, given the roster issues of Indy Eleven and the required adjustments to the starting lineup, I think Indy was satisfied with, if not happy with, the empty score line. The question coming back out of the halftime break was whether the Eleven had the legs in them to play out the game with the limited substitutes available. 

There are teams where their first thought is to move forward towards their opponent’s goal. That is not this team's first thought for most of the players for most of the game. Velasquez was the only one tonight who reluctantly passed backwards as he wants to attack, not methodically break down Tampa Bay, which was the general effort from Indy for much of the second half. The urgency going forward just wasn't there for stretches of the game. Martinez continues to go forward, but as soon as he gets into a position to send in a cross or attack with the dribble, he stops, puts his foot on the ball, and passes backwards. I'm not sure why a guy of his ability goes backwards so frequently where there are players like Guenzatti and Pinho in the box eagerly waiting for a cross.

I would like to tell you exactly how Coach Lowry thought of the performance, but he no longer comes back out to address the media. He did go Twitter to commend the BYB for their effort today in the doubleheader, where he also said he was happy with his team's effort. That's the extent of what I know from his perspective.

From my perspective, at this point in the season, Indy hasn't shown much chance of moving up the table into a better playoff position, and, in fact, dropped down after tonight's results. If Indy want to remain in a playoff position, they need to be as concerned with how the teams below them are performing and both Tulsa and Detroit have leap frogged Indy in recent weeks. There are some games in hand with those teams, but Indy is currently headed in the wrong direction from a playoff perspective.

After watching the women's team play an exciting game, winning a league championship in the process, the men's nightcap was always going to feel like a bit of a let down, regardless of the result. In front of 11,000+ fans, a nil-nil draw left me feeling like Indy managed the game despite having some opportunities to get more out of the game. Congratulations though to Quinn who became the league's all-time leader in minutes played.

Indy head on the road on Wednesday to play Pittsburgh, and then follow that up with a road trip to Louisville next Saturday. Diz Pe and Dambrot will be back from their suspensions giving Lowry some additional options with the starting lineup and substitutions. How much they do with the returning players will be seen.

One the downhill side of the season, Indy are going to need to start getting more points from games or Indy is going to be watching the playoffs from their homes yet again.

The Game Beckons Game Ball

Velasquez stands out for me in this game with his effort and ability (and desire) to attack the Tampa Bay defense. That, by itself, is enough for me to give him tonight's GBGB.

Photos (Don Thompson Photography)