Photo courtesy of Gregory Ng from NCFCShots.com
josh coan contr
After a solid stretch that saw North Carolina FC pick up 11 points in six games, NCFC fell 4-1 to league-leading Chattanooga Red Wolves SC for the team’s second consecutive loss on Tuesday, Aug. 10.
While NCFC had some solid spells of play, the team looked disjointed in the attack for the majority of the game and the defense was caught sleeping on multiple occasions.
“We did not begin the game in any way, shape or form, prepared to play a professional soccer game,” said NCFC head coach John Bradford. “The energy, the idea of how hard we have to work to be able to defend and not give up goals against, obviously, a really good team in terms of production and goal scoring was disappointing and I know the guys are disappointed in themselves.”
Chattanooga dominated the opening 20 minutes of the match and jumped out to an early 2-0 lead. While there were some defensive miscues in the buildup to both goals, the assist for each goal was very nice.
In the 13th minute, Ricky Ruiz received a hard-hit ball and just put enough on it to deceive the NCFC defense and get Marky Hernandez in behind.
Just eight minutes later Ruiz picked up his second assist of the game, delivering an inch-perfect cross to the far post for a wide-open Jackson Dietrich.
“The first goal, one of our centerbacks steps and doesn’t win it, but there’s no reaction from the rest of the group, and it’s a guy that’s straight in on goal,” Bradford said. “They were not collective in terms of how we’re defending on that one. The second goal, kind of fake defending on the guy that gets a service, he’s got all the time in the world to be able to pick out his mark and we aren’t marked up. It’s pretty simple. If we don’t play better defense, we’re going to concede goals. That’s not just the back four and the goalkeeper by any stretch, that’s from front to back.”
NCFC started to get more into the game after the two goals, creating some decent chances, but the team was unable to get anything to go. North Carolina had two different calls for a penalty during the opening half. Robby Kristo was involved in both incidents with the forward being taken down as a corner flew into the box and one of his shots being blocked off the line with a possible handball after he rounded the keeper.
“The first 25 minutes where they create really two chances that they convert to goals, then we all of a sudden, start trying to establish ourselves into the game,” Bradford said. “I thought we were sticking to what we tried to do for the second part of the first half and then in moments in the second half for sure. Our blueprint is pretty pretty straightforward, if we all compete, if we all move the ball, if we all work together, that’s when we’re successful.”
After the break, NCFC continued to get more into the game, but struggled to get that final pass to click. In the 70th minute, Chattanooga made NCFC pay for the missed chances as substitute Juan Galindrez pounced on a ball that was headed up in the air after a corner.
Chattanooga picked up one final goal in the 76th minute as Jonathan Ricketts lobbed in a cross that just snuck in at the far post. Ruiz picked up his third assist of the game on Ricketts’ goal.
Late in stoppage time, NCFC substitute Cole Frame pulled one back for NCFC. The 18-year-old drifted into the box and blasted home a cross from Nelson Blanco Flores. Despite NCFC having stretches of both good and bad form, Frame has been a consistent spark of offense either off the bench or when he cracks the starting lineup.
NCFC will have a chance to bounce back from the back-to-back losses on Saturday, Aug. 14 with a trip to North Texas SC.