Indy Eleven vs Cosmos - 04.28

- Opponent: New York Cosmos
- Location: Indianapolis
- Attendance: 8,998
- Final Score: 2-2 D
- Starting XI: Busch, Franco, Falvey, Miller, Keller, Ring, Torrado, Smart, Speas, Vukovic, Zayed
- Substitutions: Junior 82' (Smart)
- Unused: Cardona, Watson-Siriboe, Henderson, Ubiparipovic, Thompson, Goldsmith
- Goals: Smart 27' (assist Franco), Zayed 64' (assist Smart)
- Bookings: Falvey 32' (Yellow), Ring 53' (Yellow), Torrado 53' (Yellow), Zayed 90'+3' (Yellow)
- Adage goals: One

A game against the Cosmos ends in a draw more than 70% of the time, so we should just expect that as the baseline going into the game. No lead is safe. No deficit is impossible to overcome. The Eleven scored first with a blast from Smart just inside the corner of the 18-yard box. The Cosmos countered with a goal of their own first half goal nine minutes later, when Ledesma out-worked Falvey and Miller and followed-up a rocket from Marquez that Busch could do nothing with but parry away. Falvey and Miller stood flat-footed as Ledesma ran right past them to get to the rebound.

Seconds after the halftime whistle blew, the sky's opened and a heavy rain forced fans to find shelter where possible. Many people decided that their shelter would be their car and never returned. For those that stayed, the second half provided them much of the same as the first half. The Cosmos held more possession and more than doubled the number of shots, but the Eleven put the ball in the back of the net first in the 64th minute when first half goalscorer Smart turned provider and put a ball across the goal face that Zayed, prone to be in an offside position during this game, timed perfectly and calmly put past Maurer. Yet just like the first half, the Eleven couldn't hold onto the lead, and Marquez scored on a shot inside the box after the defense was slow to react.

Coach Hankinson once again employed Vukovic in the midfield. Based on goals scored, you would have to question its success, but I personally feel much more comfortable with Keller in the backline. Much like Palmer wasn't going to get as involved in the offense as Franco, Keller isn't going to go forward and forego his defensive responsibilities. What I don't understand with the change, is why he keeps lining up on the right side of the field with Smart on the left side of the field. Neither player wants to send in a cross from that side with their less-favored leg, so each player turns and brings the ball into the middle so that they can serve a ball with their preferred leg. Both players, and by extension the team, were much more successful on their desired side of the field.

Mathematically, the team is still alive. Realistically, the Eleven needed to come away with a win at home against one of the teams ahead of them in the Combined Table. Particularly with games against the two league-leading teams this week in San Francisco and home versus Miami. Unfortunately, the team squandered two separate leads and racked up a few more yellows. Which, if you're keeping track, both Ring and Smart are a yellow away from getting their 5th yellow in the Fall Season and will have to sit for yellow card accumulation and Torrado, having already served a one-game suspension for his yellow cards, is now just one more yellow card away from serving his second one-game suspension. I doubt he makes it through the next three games without getting a card, it will just depend on when it happens. 

The Game Beckons Game Ball:

I've been stingy with the GBGB in the Fall Season, but Smart deserves it for this game for putting the team on his back and getting it done on the offensive end of the field. The defense didn't help him out, but put in a solid shift to try and get the team a win. "Mr. Indy" also reached 100 appearances (across all competitions) for the Indy Eleven in this game. Whether he's back next year or not, Smart's been fighting for this team for a long time and continued that effort on Saturday night.

Photos (courtesy of Don Thompson Photography):

Highlights:

Indy Eleven vs Puerto Rico FC - 04.27

- Opponent: Puerto Rico FC
- Location: Indianapolis
- Attendance: 4,209
- Final Score: 5-0 L
- Starting XI: Busch, Franco, Falvey, Watson-Siriboe, Keller, Ring, Torrado,  Smart, Speas, Vukovic, Zayed
- Substitutions: Miller 58' (Keller), Henderson 75' (Franco), Goldsmith 83' (Speas)
- Unused: Cardona, Ubiparipovic, Thompson, Junior
- Goals: Zayed 37', Zayed 62' (assist Franco)
- Bookings: Torrado 55' (Yellow), Miller 86' (Yellow), Goldsmith 90'+2' (Yellow), Watson-Siriboe 90'+3' (Yellow)
- Adage goals: One

It’s a win, right? It could have been a shut-out, if not for a bogus handball call inside the box on a free kick in the 87th minute. Yes, it was a wrong call. I’ve watched it several times, slowed it down, and Torrado is clearly in the process of turning his body away from the kick so that the ball hits the backside of his arm and chest. There was definitely no intent, to the extent that Torrado’s head was turned 180 degrees from where the ball was kicked. He couldn’t have “accidentally” put his arm in the path of the ball because he had absolutely no clue where it was going to be. Once again, a horrible decision by the refs provided an opposing team with a penalty kick, which makes the 7th CONVERTED penalty kick on the season. To one for the Eleven...

I digress…

It was a win, right? Zayed finally found the back of the net. Twice. The first, in the 37th minute, off a hustle play where he did what he does best. He sniffs around the goal and waits for the cheese and then pounces on it. Smart put a good ball forward to Speas, who actually turned and shot the ball. Off the deflection, Zayed got to the ball first and put the ball under Spangenberg. The second, in the 62nd minute, Zayed got just enough of his head to the ball from a Franco cross to put the ball over Spangenberg. With family in town, on his birthday, Zayed picked a good day to get back to his scoring ways.

This was a game of two halves for the Eleven. They continued their sloppy passes and careless touches from Sunday's game against NCFC. Puerto Rico had twice as many chances created in the first half and held a 60/40 advantage in possession. The Eleven had four different guys who completed less than 70% of their passes in the first half, with Vuko completing a team low of 57% of his passes. They performed much better in the second half, but there's still a look of a team that ddon't seem to know where each other is going to go. Which is unfathomable with guys who've been playing with each other for as many games as many of these guys have together.

Prior to the game, I had a discussion with an observant fan/writer about how NCFC consistently exploited a weakness in the Indy Eleven defense by putting balls over the top of Vuko, forcing Miller to slide over to cover while Vuko trailed the play. As Miller slid over, that forced the rest of the defense to try and cover, oftentimes with last ditch defending. How do you overcome this? Well, if you're Coach Hankinson, then you put Daniel Keller in at left back and put Vuko in a left winger, playing to where he tends to go anyway. Honestly, I'm not sure why it's taken this long to try this experiment. I suppose it's helpful to have enough healthy defenders, and an improved play by Watson-Siriboe certainly made this work better than if KWS had some of the errors he's had in previous games.

Speaking of KWS... I've been routinely frustrated at his play in the past, but I love how he stood up for his teammate at the end of the game. First off, Goldsmith deserved his yellow card in stoppage time and the ref was correct in having the card out of his pocket before Martinez stopped rolling around. The second Gentile pushed Goldsmith, center ref Jon Freemon should have turned to give Gentile his second yellow card of the game. However, instead of giving the yellow to Gentile for retaliation, directly in front of him, Freemon waited to give the yellow to the retaliation's retaliation when KWS shoved Gentile. KWS knew he was getting a card, accepted it graciously, and fully expected that Gentile would receive what he deserved. Once again, the ref failed to do his job properly and Gentile gets to play again this weekend in North Carolina unless the league does their job properly and suspends him. I'm not going to bank on that happening though. My favorite part of this end-of-the-game fiasco was reading KWS's lips as he turns back to Gentile in the scrum and yells, "what's wrong with you?"

It was an eventful end to the game, but a game that the Eleven desperately needed to win. A game on a Wednesday night with a short turnaround between games, against another bottom of the table team, with the Cosmos headed to town on Saturday. The Eleven desperately needed to win. The Eleven needed the win to keep any chance to making the playoffs. Maybe the team still believes. Maybe you do too.

Maybe I will after Saturday...

Photos (courtesy of Don Thompson Photography):

Highlights:

Indy Eleven vs North Carolina FC - 04.26

- Opponent: North Carolina FC
- Location: Cary, North Carolina
- Attendance: 4,209
- Final Score: 5-0 L
- Starting XI: Busch, Franco, Falvey, Miller, Vukovic, Ring, Henderson, Junior, Thompson, Speas, Goldsmith
- Substitutions: Watson-Siriboe 45' (Falvey), Keller 45' (Ring), Ables 65' (Speas)
- Unused: Cardona, Smart, Zayed
- Goals: NONE
- Bookings: NONE
- Adage goals: THREE

I've been saying that it might be time to give the young guys some more playing time to see if they can provide a spark to the team that seems to be missing from their older counterparts. I don't know if that thought process had anything to do with it, but Coach Hankinson took the lineup and significantly reduced the average age, particularly in the second half, when both Ring and captain Falvey were pulled at halftime for Keller and Watson-Siriboe. Speas continued for another 20 minutes in the second half before his replacement in Adrian Ables found the field. Not counting Busch, at the end of the game, Vuko was the oldest player on the field for the Eleven at the age of 33. Henderson is barely 30 and the rest of the lineup consisted of twentysomethings. I'm not sure what precipitated the change in Coach's mind, butthe youth were clearly given their chance. Torrado and Ubi didn't even make the trip while Smart and Zayed were available for selection but didn't play.

Unfortunately, the spark created by the young guys ignited a dumpster fire. A 2nd largest goal differential in the history of the Indy Eleven dumpster fire. It could have been much worse dumpster fire.

Passes were sloppy, touches were careless, and goals were aplenty for NCFC, starting with a goal in the 9th minute where Gorne got inside position on Miller. NCFC were the aggressor from the start, providing constant pressure on the ball every time the Eleven players had the ball, whereas the opposite mindset was in play when NCFC had the ball. Indy chased the ball as North Carolina moved it at will around them.

NASL Scoreline Summary

Last week, the team posted an article on their site, written by Eamon Zayed. Zayed has done this a couple times this year, but this post relates to his time as a youth with Leicester City FC and "the fairytale story of the 2015/16 season when Leicester went on to secure the most unfathomable dream of winning the Premiership Title that year." Zayed goes onto describe how prior to the 2015/16 season, the Foxes were 9 games from the end of the season, having won only 4 times in 29 games and being 7 points away from the relegation line. They then proceeded to win 7 of their last 9 games and securing their stay in the Premier League and then winning the entire thing the next year. Zayed conveys this story because he was looking for belief that the Indy Eleven, with 8 games remaining at that point, could go on a run to get into this year's NASL Championship. I thought of this article after the NCFC game, not because I had the same belief as Zayed that the team could go on this year, but because he had the Leicester City reference correct, just the wrong years...

In the 2015/16 Premier League, Leicester City won the league. In the 2016/17 season, Leicester City "finished 12th, thereby setting a new record for the worst Premier League title defense." In 2015, the Indy Eleven finished 9th out of the then 11 teams in the NASL, but got wins in two of their last three games. In 2016, the Eleven had their own fairytale story, winning the Spring Championship and going undefeated at home. Like water, maybe Leicester City and the Indy Eleven have just "found their level" and last year's amazing run can, and should, be looked as a lightning in the bottle season where very few things went wrong.

Maybe I'm just being pessimistic again, but the guys looked disinterested, like they were going through the motions to just get through a crappy, injury-riddled season, in a league that might not be here next year. If that's the case, I can understand their mentality, because it's much the same way as I feel right now continuing to write these posts.

Guess we'll get to see how interested I'll be in writing on Wednesday.

Highlights:

Indy Eleven vs Armada - 04.25

- Opponent: Jacksonville Armada
- Location: Jacksonville
- Attendance: 1,881
- Final Score: 0-0 D
- Starting XI: Busch, Franco, Falvey, Miller, Vukovic, Ring, Torrado, Smart, Speas, Ubiparipovic, Zayed
- Substitutions: Junior 64' (Speas), Goldsmith 64' (Torrado), Henderson 85' (Ring)
- Unused: Cardona, Watson-Siriboe, Thompson
- Goals: None
- Bookings: Smart 37' (Yellow), Ring 69' (Yellow)
- Adage goals: None

At some point, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that this isn't working. Watch the highlights below. Put together by the Indy Eleven, not the NASL, the Indy Eleven. They had to go all the way to the 73rd minute before they could find a single offensive highlight worth putting in the video and it was a result of Paulo Junior, Don Smart, and David Goldsmith. The New Guy, Mr. Indy, and The Kid.

Coach Hankinson employed what has become the team's now typical 4-2-3-1 lineup with the regular back four, Ring and Torrado holding the fort just ahead of them, and then Speas, Smart, and Ubiparipovic as the midfielders, with Zayed as the lone forward. Defend first, attack on the counter.

The attacking four had 3 shots, with only 1 of those on frame. All by Smart. Speas, Ubiparipovic, and Zayed all had goose eggs in the attack. Goldsmith had 2 shots on goal in half the time. Yes, it could be argued that the tactics changed when Goldsmith came in and that the game opened up significantly towards the end of the game, but for a team that desperately needs wins to give themselves any kind of chance to be one of the final four playing at the end of the year, they need more tooth to their offense beyond what we're seeing right now.

The Jacksonville commentators were very partisan in their call of the game, but I don't think they were wrong in stating that the Armada should have won the game. The Eleven are fortunate to have come away from the away game with a draw. I think the team has reached the point where the young guys start getting their shot. The playoffs are being further and further from being a possibility and since I think those guys could be around next year, they might as well start seeing some more minutes. Some may argue that there's still too much time left to throw in the towel, but when you get three shots on goal from your four attacking starters, what does it matter. Give Goldsmith, Thompson, and Ables a chance. Might as well throw Cardona and Lomeli into that group too. I love Jon Busch, and this team might not be in the position they're in if not for his superior goalkeeping, but this team isn't clicking right now and I, personally, don't see the difference between a draw on the road with a bunch of young guys or the performance we saw tonight out of veterans.

The Game Beckons Game Ball:

Cory Miller. Miller has come back from his injury with the same hard-nosed defending we all remember from last year. If you're coming into his space, you're going to know it. He's always on the edge of getting a card of one color or the other, but I guarantee that Banks, Taylor, and Gebhard are going to see Cory in their nightmares. How many last ditch efforts did Miller have to time perfectly and he got them all right?

Highlights: