Payback time? Nashville missed a likely game-winning penalty kick, suffered three injuries and a red card, and lost 2-0 in the Great White North just a few weeks ago. Can they earn revenge over Ottawa Fury this evening?
The essentials
Opponent: Ottawa Fury (9-9-4 USL). 22 GF, 27 GA so far in 2018, 8th in USL East, 7th in USL East Power Ratings and 21st in combined-table Pure Power.
Recent form: OTT (D-W-L-W-W) NSH (D-L-W-L-L)
The Line: Nashville SC +121, Ottawa Fury +219, Draw +186
Time, Location: 7:30 p.m. CDT • First Tennessee Park
Event: USL Regular season
Weather: 84ºF, 0% chance of rain, 35% humidity, 10 MPH Easterly winds
Tailgate: With The Assembly here, Music City Supporters at Germantown Depot, with the Roadies at Pastime.
Watch: In Person! Locally on MyTV30, stream with a subscription to ESPN+. See the list of soccer bars in Nashville if you want to watch remotely.
Listen: Locally on 94.9 Game2 in English, 96.7 El Jefe FM en Español.
Follow: @NashvilleSC, @ClubCountryUSA, USL gametracker page, #NSHvOTT
Elsewhere: You’re currently reading literally the only outlet that covers the team, apparently.
Ottawa Fury
Here’s what I had about the Fury last time around:
As of today, this team is better than it appears. While it took until their seventh game to get an average-or-better performance (and their first win, a 1-0 road result over Penn FC), they’ve been below-average only four times in the 11 games since then: they’ve rounded into form in a major way.
When you look at their defense (23 goals allowed in 18 games), it may not seem good on its face. Drill it down further once again, though, and 14 of those goals were allowed in their first five games: in the 13 since, they’ve allowed just nine goals, four of them in a 4-2 barn-burning loss to Charlotte Independence on the road. The offense has hardly lit the world on fire regardless of location (they’ve scored three goals twice, against NYRBII and TFCII, both pretty poor defensive teams), and when accounting for quality of opposition has actually been quite a bit worse at home.
So they’re getting it done defensively, and that effort is led by keeper Maxime Crepeau, who has shockingly not been named to the Best XI of the Week list once this year (though nor has Matt Pickens – it’s a lot of not paying attention going on with that vote), despite being the “bench” keeper four times. He’s tied for third in the league with eight clean sheets – it’s also frustrating that you can’t look up save percentage rankings for keepers in USL’s stats engines, but I would imagine his .762 success rate is up there. He’s helped in a major way by a very strong back four defensively: Colin Falvey and Nana Attakora are both outstanding centerbacks (though Falvey has been banged-up lately, ceding his spot to Thomas Meuilleur-Giguère), and left back Onua Obasi has been a multiple Team of the Week selection.
As I mentioned above, news of their offensive renaissance has been greatly exaggerated: they’ve been shut out in two of their last three home matches, and they’ve only scored multiple times in five games (against Atlanta 2, Toronto II, Penn FC, New York II, and North Carolina), and one of those was in a loss. It’s fairly common to keep them from scoring twice or more, and if they don’t hit that mark, the defense is solid-not-elite enough to keep high-scoring teams off the board – alas, Nashville is certainly not such a team.
The offensive effort is led by Steevan Dos Santos’s four marks, while Adonijah Reid and Kévin Oliveira are the only other multi-goal scorers with three apiece. All three of Reid’s came in the game against New York Red Bulls II, for which he was named to the team of the week. Right winger Carl Haworth has been in-and-out of the lineup with minor injuries lately, but when on the pitch, he’s the team’s captain. He was also the goal-scorer and the near-assist man in the preseason friendly between these sides. He’s tied for the team lead with two assists, alongside Dos Santos and Tony Taylor.
Ottawa has been mixing up formations a bit, but when they have the full squad, prefer either a 4-4-2 or a 4-3-3 (perhaps a semantic difference, with Haworth playing pretty high on the right side either way).
Nashville was unable to solve the defense last time around – which is hardly shameful, but was certainly disappointing – and it’s probably gotten even better with the addition of former NSC defender David Edgar, who I would expect to play for his new club (and against his old one) this evening.
“Ottawa have, after a difficult start, have shown all of the qualities that I think a postseason team should have,” Nashville head coach Gary Smith said. “They’re very difficult to play against. They’ve got some experience. They’re well-organized, they’re tough to break down. They’ve got some tough individuals, and they’re a very good counterattacking side with some decent attacking options. And they’re in good form.
“They’re confident, so they’ve got all of the credentials to be in that top eight. Again, the real challenge for us is going to be with a team around us, and as we go into this final 10-12 games or so, we’re going to start to find that there are more and more of those teams that are desperate for points. A victory for us keeps us a game in hand over them and three points in front. Outside of that, the race gets tighter and tighter. We have to do everything we possibly can to win the game, to put some daylight between us, and to make the challenge for them that much more difficult in the final stretch.”
The offense didn’t get much going against NSC last time around until after several injuries (and then the red card). The composition of it is still basically the same. Will it have the same results against Nashville SC in First Tennessee Park? And presuming the injury luck doesn’t hit in an incredible way? We shall see.
The Boys in Gold
Last time around, I said that Nashville SC would try out a new formation because they would be without Bolu Akinyode – the latter turned out to be true, but the former didn’t. This time, we should see an NSC team that’s back to full health for the first time since, well, about the fourth minute of the game in Ottawa.
Nashville needs to win, it needs to make a statement. We’ll see as close to a full-strength lineup (I’m predicting no Bradley Bourgeois as he continues recovering from injury) as possible.
We should also see a new face. The meager offense of Nashville is due for an injection of energy, and Wednesday signing Kris Tyrpak can provide exactly that. He’s an impact scorer, the release was not-so-subtle that he’d be in the squad tonight… it’s mostly a matter of where exactly he’ll be lining up. Smith gave some pretty enlightening statements there:
Kris was available to try and add to the group, and what he gives us, as I said in the week, it gives us goal scoring options from the wide area,” he explained. “We’re a team, if anything has left us a little bit short, it’s been our ability to score goals or convert. Plenty of other good areas to our group, but hopefully Kris will add another dimension and can chip in with two or three goals towards this run here.
Sounds like a winger role, with other wing options coming off the bench – though I maintain that as a second striker or attacking midfielder he can make a similar impact.
Projected lineups
Here’s what I’m looking for:
There’s flexibility between Moloto and Typak, with either capable of being the withdrawn striker or the right winger (for the lefty Tyrpak, that’d be for a finishing role rather than a crossing one). Some switching between the two is likely, especially if things aren’t going well at a given moment.
As mentioned above, I’m thinking Bourgeois gets another weekend off, but otherwise it’s a full-strength lineup.
Predictions
Last time around, I thought Ottawa would have a hard time scoring, but would bag one late. That was essentially the case… the issue was that Nashville also had a hard time scoring, then had injurypocalypse happen. I project that won’t take place again.
- Nashville has a tough time scoring again… but slightly less so (even with a reinforced defensive unit for Ottawa).
- Your subs: Ropapa Mensah replaces Tucker Hume (55′; I’m going to keep predicting this one until it happens), Taylor Washington replaces Ish Jome (65′), Alan Winn replaces Kris Tyrpak (73′).
- Whichever combination of Moloto, Tyrpak, and the true wingers (starting Jome, with Washington and Winn both playing) will be pretty fluid whomever is on the field. There can be interchanging between that reserved striker and either wing, given Tyrpak and Moloto’s flexibility. The front group will probably be a bit more exciting (and difficult for the opponent and fans to figure out) than we’ve grown accustomed to lately.
- Michael Reed is your game-winning goalscorer on a long blast after Nashville has made all three subs (but not too long after).
Nashville wins 1-0. The offensive struggles aren’t going to be solved in the first game with a new signing, even if Tyrpak is the answer to fixing it. Still, Nashville’s defense at home is nigh impenetrable (just three goals allowed, two to Indy and one against Penn after the game was decided), and I think they can find offense inside First Tennessee.
Club and Country 