After beginning the restart in near-perfect fashion, North Carolina FC picked up its first loss since March 8, falling 2-0 to Group G-leading Birmingham Legion FC on Saturday evening at Sahlen’s Stadium.
Heading into Saturday, NCFC had picked up seven points from a possible nine since the restart, including taking all three off Birmingham on Aug. 1, but entering Saturday’s contest, the hosts found themselves trailing the group-leading Legion by seven points.
While NCFC does have three games in hand over the Alabama club, the other members of Group G are neck and neck with Charlotte Independence overtaking it in the standings after taking down Memphis 3-2 on Saturday night and Memphis trailing NCFC by just two points. NCFC does have one game in hand on Charlotte and two on Memphis, however.
NCFC controlled the majority of the ball in the opening 45 minutes and dictated the tempo to start the game but a three-minute horror show at the back saw a deflected shot ricochet past NCFC goalkeeper Alex Tambakis and center back Sam Brotherton gave away a penalty with a hand ball in the box, allowing the visitors to build an early 2-0 lead.
“The first goal, we didn’t do well,” said NCFC head coach Dave Sarachan. “We had talked about being aggressive from the start and, for whatever reason, the player who scored was left kind of alone. The second goal obviously hurt us with the hand ball. It was unfortunate but it was a penalty. So now, when you are down two to zero you are chasing the game. They did what I figured they would do. They played very defensive and compact. It made it hard on us.”
The hosts continued to hold the majority of the possession for the remainder of the first half but they were unable to convert the possession into quality shots, finding the target just once in the opening 45.
NCFC continued to control the ball in the second half but once again struggled to convert that possession into quality chances.
“Our quality in front of goal, our decisions in terms of being patient, when we should be patient, when we should up the tempo was just a little off tonight for whatever reason,” Sarachan said. “They blocked a lot of plays and we just didn’t do a good enough job getting enough balls on goal tonight.”
One notable absence from NCFC’s lineup compared to its previous two games, both of which were wins, was left back Akeem Ward. With Ward out of the lineup, DJ Taylor shifted from right back to left back and Alex Comsia started the game at right back.
While Comsia is a competent defender, he offers less going forward than Ward. Without the one-two punch of Ward and Taylor marauding down the sidelines, NCFC wasn’t able to create chances as freely as it had been in the wins over Birmingham and Memphis.
“I don’t know if I would attribute it to the loss of Akeem, certainly we missed him, he had an injury so we had to make some changes there,” Sarachan said. “I didn’t think that was an effect on the quality of our guys tonight. We were just a step late, we didn’t have enough quality in front of goal tonight… As much as we would like to have Akeem, I can’t say that result was a result of not having him in.”
NCFC has a short turnaround before its next game as it will be back in action on Wednesday as it looks to get back to winning ways with the Charleston Battery coming to Sahlen’s Stadium.
“Mentally, we have to switch this game off,” Sarachan said. “We will learn from it. We will take some of the positives and negatives and then focus for a quick turnaround. In some ways I’m kind of glad we have a quick turnaround, to put this past us. We are going to be facing a team in Charleston that is going to give us a hard game… We just have to take some of the good and bad and move on.”
North Carolina FC defender Alex Comisa questions a call from the referee during the game versus Birmingham Legion FC on Saturday, Aug. 15, 2020 in Sahlen's Stadium at WakeMed Soccer Park. North Carolina FC defender Conor Donovan grabs his head after hitting heads with a Birmingham Legion FC player during the second half of the game on Saturday, Aug. 15, 2020 in Sahlen's Stadium at Wake Med Soccer Park. NCFC lost to Birmingham Legion FC 2-0.
