RootsBlog

Oakland Roots snapped a five-game winless streak on Saturday night with its dramatic 2-1 victory over Orange County at Pioneer Stadium. The victory came all the way down to the final moments of the game with Gagi Margvelashvili’s goal in the fourth minute of second-half stoppage time.

Following a throw in from Justin Rasmussen to Jeciel Cedeño, the Ecuadorian sent a long pass from around midfield to Gagi charging into the penalty area. The Georgian took Cedeño’s pass off of his chest before the ball bounced once leading to Gagi skipping in a right-footed shot past OC’s Colin Shutler. His shot went in with just three seconds left to play at 93:57.

It marked interim head coach Gavin Glinton’s first win of his managerial career.

“I honestly don’t remember, I think I blacked out,” Glinton said with a laugh. “Just kidding. Yeah, we don’t want to have it to have that happen all the time. But it just felt like the guys believed all the way until the end. The bench believed all the way until the end and when it happened, it was almost unreal. But you almost expected it the way the guys put in the energy and the focus tonight. It’s great to get a first win like that, hopefully there are not too many more gray-hair-inducing victories, but I’ll take them any way they come.

Orange County opened scoring in the 21st minute when Thomas Amang landed a free header a couple of feet in front of net after Ryan Doghman arced in a perfect cross over Niall Logue.

But just 10 minutes later, Trayvone Reid scored a penalty kick after drawing a foul in the box. In the buildup, Rasmussen received a long pass a few feet outside of the penalty area, taking one touch to redirect the ball into the path of Reid. The Jamaican forward was ruled to get to the ball despite Orange County defender Markus Nakkim getting a foot on the ball int he replay. However, Nakkim barreling through Reid was enough to warrant a foul.

After going into halftime in an even affair with Oakland having six shots with its only attempt on target being Trayvone’s goal, while Orange County finished the first 45 minutes with four shots and two on target. Roots then cranked out 13 shots in the second half including two more big scoring chances, doing it without Johnny Rodriguez after suffering a game-ending injury in the third minute.

“I don’t think the gameplan changed much,” Glinton said when asked about what changed after conceding a goal. “The goal against was a big deflator for a minute, but the guys took a deep breath and got right back to it. I was really happy with that that pause in the moment, to just regroup and get right back with the job… It would’ve been nice to go into halftime with the lead, but they did an excellent job of coming back out and continuing to fight.”

Here are our talking points coming out of Saturday’s match.

Attacking output

It arguably could’ve been a four-goal game for Oakland. Roots recorded a season-high 19 shots with five on target and converting on two of three big scoring chances. Their output marked their third most shot attempts in franchise history.

Saturday’s total eclipsed their 18 shot attempts recorded when they defeated Los Angeles Galaxy II 3-2 back in May of 2021, two short of their 21 attempts in a 3-3 tie with Sac Republic in July 2022, and nine short of the 28 attempts taken in a 3-1 win over Atlanta United II in June 2022.

“I thought we executed fantastically, we wanted to be able to stretch out Orange County. We talked a lot about being able to build up in some versatile ways, being able to move and run a lot, and be very, very aggressive in the final third. I thought the guys did an excellent job, I’m so happy for them,” Glinton said.

Their missed big chance came in the 68th minute when Shutler spilled a pass back to him, leading to the ball falling to Miche-Naider Chéry for a shot that lasered into Shutler on the ground. Cedeño eventually took a shot that was deflected and curled toward net, but it was cleared off of the line by Orange County.

Oakland had several other good looks in the second half. Camden Riley had a header on the doorstep loop over after Neveal Hackshaw fed him a cross in the 57th. Reid did well to free himself up for a shot on target in the 73rd, while Cedeño had a shot from a good area go wide left in the 79th.

Hackshaw had a couple of good chancer the final 10 minutes. He was the target of a corner in the 85th minute, but his header went high over net. Then at 88′, Chéry had a shot blocked back to Hackshaw about eight yards in front of net, but his attempt sailed, once again.

“I think we have a lot of players who can hurt teams in different ways. What we want to do is to be very dynamic and very fluid in how we’re able to hurt teams. We’ve got different players who can create different matchups. Us continuing to grow and feel more comfortable in those moments, you can see there’s been a lot of success already. As we get more comfortable, I think being unpredictable is going to be crucial for us.”

Glinton previously described his system to be intense, proactive, and eager to get on the ball. Saturday’s result, especially in the second half, showed signs of how he wants Oakland to operate, often posing problems to Orange County with constant pressure.

During his first interview following the U.S. Open Cup in San Jose, Glinton spoke about “cultural” changes he envisioned for his team. He expanded on the topic on Saturday night.

“We talked about more focus, attention to detail, and attention to quality. I think just making sure we continue to fight and have that in us from minute one to minute 90. I think we saw that with that excellent effort from the guys. But its mostly continuing to build on what we’ve been doing and tighten up in some certain detail areas,” Glinton said.

Johnny’s injury & Chéry’s effectiveness

Johnny’s injury in the third minute gave a bleak outlook for the match, but filling in effectively was Miche-Naider Chéry. Despite not getting on the scoresheet, Chéry did well stepping in on short-notice and playing the remaining 82 minutes.

He finished with a 7.0 rating, recording three shots with one on target, completing nine passes including one into the final third, creating one scoring chance and took four touches inside the opponent’s penalty area. Chéry also made an impact being a nuisance when Orange County was in possession, winning all five of his tackle attempts.

Glinton mentioned how he wants his teams to be the aggressors. A 6 foot, 7 inch striker running down opposing players could be a good way of executing that.

“Miche came in and did an excellent job for us tonight; holding up the ball, being dangerous, and getting to the end of stuff. He pressured people as well on the defensive side. I’ve always said we have a really, really deep group and its kind of the next-man-up-mentality. I think there’s a lot of ways we can hurt teams and I know we can do it. Credit to Miche tonight, I don’t think he missed a beat,” Glinton said.

Chéry was signed in the offseason as a perceived instant impact-maker in the attack. The tall center forward still hasn’t solidified a starting role so far this season, but is a physical talent with limited professional experience at 26-years-old. With Johnny now set to miss more time with his lingering groin injury, Chéry should be expected to get more time.

“We know how raw he is and his potential but we’ve seen a lot of growth from him over the last few weeks in terms of his consistency and being much more difficult to defend,” Glinton said. “He’s starting to attract the attention more than one defender, which frees up guys that can hurt underneath or one the wings. We just want to continue to have him develop and work on consistency is crucial for us.”

Trayvone Reid

Trayvone Reid put together arguably his best performance in an Oakland Roots uniform as the left winger in Saturday’s 3-4-3. He earned FotMob’s Man of the Match with an 8.6 rating, recording three shots, two successful dribbles, won seven duels, took nine touches inside the opponent’s penalty area and 41 touches in total.

His penalty and conversion helped inflate his ratings, but he still did a great job of drawing the foul. Saturday’s heatmap shows how Trayvone was a problem on the left side and made a living on the left side of Orange County’s penalty area.

Glinton praised his Reid was able to drive into the penalty area and create space for himself.

“Tray is another one with fantastic talent, you can see he’s a handful going inside driving at people,” Glinton said. “I think he’s starting to come into his own as well, he’s starting to really see that belief and drive to get behind teams and make defenders have to deal with him. When Tray’s a problem like that, it makes the game easier for the rest of the team and we start to be really, really dangerous going forward.”