Oakland Roots may have won its biggest game of the season thus far in its 1-nil win over perennial Eastern Conference contenders, Tampa Bay Rowdies at Pioneer Stadium on the backend of its annual double-header with Oakland Soul. It was a solid performance for all 90 minutes and hopefully a measuring stick of what this team can achieve.
Saturday marked Roots’ second clean sheet in three matches after not having any over a 24-game span, it’s another feather in the cap of interim head coach Gavin Glinton. To shut down Tampa Bay, Glinton explains how their approach was fluidly changing.
“I think we must have played probably about four different formations tonight at some point or another,” Glinton said. “We knew that they are a real dangerous team and that they can get behind, so there were a couple of ways we wanted to make sure we stopped them, whether it was protecting the space in behind whether it was choking and limiting their service and service area points but I thought the guys did a great job with that.”
Roots’ game-winner came in the 72nd minute when Memo Diaz sent a pinpoint cross to Jeciel Cedeño for the header goal right in front of the net. In the buildup, Gagi Margvelashvili spotted Diaz making a wide run past Tampa Bay’s sleeping back line on the right side.
Diaz, with acres of space, landed his pass to the far post to Jeciel for the free header. We named Cedeño our RootsBlog Man of the Match for being a frequent problem for Tampa Bay.
“Cedeño is so important to us because of his versatility. He can play many different positions and roles, and his ability to run at defenders is key,” Glinton said.
Never at any point did Oakland look overmatched. Despite not having many clear chances in the opening 45 minutes with six shots but just one on target, Roots put together a second half shift with seven shots and three on target. Oakland could’ve had one more when Baboucarr Njie did a great job to draw a penalty near the end of the match, but smashed his shot against the crossbar.
“We thought we had gotten into a lot of good attacking areas and just didn’t get anything out of them,” Glinton said. “So you know, a lot of that work ended up being wasted I thought in the first half. In the second half we tried to be a little bit more aggressive, especially with the final product and finishing off plays and getting into the box. Working to get corners getting behind that line. I thought we did a good job of loosening them up a little bit.”
The Back Four
It was a strong defensive performance that was needed without Paul Blanchette available, requiring a lot from Roots’ back four of Justin Rasmussen, Gagi Margvelashvili, Neveal Hackshaw, and Memo Diaz.
Although we named Jeciel Cedeño our RootsBlog Man of the Match for scoring the game-winner, Oakland’s defense was arguably the largest difference maker on Saturday. Tampa Bay finished with 15 shots, but just four of them were on target while seven went wide and another four were blocked.
John Morrissey highlighted how the defense, along with center midfielder Camden Riley, made all the difference for Roots.
Memo earned FotMob’s highest rating with an 8.5 after recording his third assist of the season, putting the game-winning goal on a platter for Cedeño to head in. He created three scoring chances, 11 passes into the final third, completed six long balls, won five duels, blocked one shot, recording four clearances, six interceptions, and took 13 defensive actions.
On the other side, Rasmussen continues to prove himself as a starter. He earned a 7.5 FotMob rating by making a big impact as a defender with one clearance, three interceptions, three recoveries, and six defensive actions. He also won four duels.
Hackshaw had a 7.5 rating as well with two blocked shots, seven clearances, eight recoveries, won five duels, and took a total of 10 defensive actions to go along with five duels.
Gagi has been critical in tracking backwards and also generating offensive looks, enabling Memo on his assist with a long pass into space. He had a 7.4 rating with one blocked shot, nine clearances, two interceptions, one recovery, one three duels, and had 15 defensive actions. He’s currently Oakland’s fourth most active player with 899 minutes.
Western Conference standings
The victory improved Roots’ record to 5-2-7 while its 17 points creates a four-way split with sixth-place San Antonio, seventh-place Colorado Springs, and eighth-place Memphis. Oakland continues to look better under Glinton, now with three wins in the last four matches and holding a 3-1-2 league record since taking over.
Much like last season, the Western Conference remains close with 10 of 12 teams separated by just 10 points. Roots remain in ninth due to goal differential, but are just two points back of third-place Monterey and fourth-place Phoenix with 19 points.
Looking ahead to the next slate of matches, Roots can do the entire conference a favor by taking down Sacramento Republic on Saturday. Monterey travels to North Carolina, Phoenix visits last-place El Paso, Colorado Springs hosts Orange County, while Memphis hosts Rhode Island on Wednesday and first-place New Mexico on Sunday.
Dom Dwyer & the striker spot
Dom Dwyer made his long awaited debut in an Oakland Roots uniform, getting 11 minutes of regulation plus stoppage time. And he looked good; he was actively on the ball with 12 touches and won three duels on the night. He also showed he adept he is at drawing fouls, gaining two free kicks in good positions.
Without a preseason ramp up, the plan was to get Dwyer involved on Saturday night. Perhaps his minutes can increase but its difficult to say if his first start is immediately on the horizon.
“Dwyer needed a long ramp up since he hadn’t played in a while. He performed well in training and it was great to see him ready to play today,” Glinton said.
It’ll be interesting to see how the rotation plays out going forward. Johnny Rodriguez got his first start since aggravating a groin injury and played the entire match, but finished the match sitting on the pitch looking like his legs were in an exasperated state. He was stretching as the game concluded, so hopefully it was just cramps, but its definitely a worrisome look during the striker’s difficult run.
With the match finishing in a two-pronged attack with Johnny and Dwyer, it appears that may be a niche in Glinton’s system for the two. It’ll be interesting to see if Glinton has more plans for a center forward combination.
Baboucarr Njie
Closing with this because its wretched to see. Baboucarr Njie was racially abused on his Instagram account, posting the hate messages he received from a few accounts. Judging the interaction, it seems like the culprit was a degenerate gambler instead of a real fan of either team. It’s a become a disgustingly common trend around the world for athletes to get online abuse from faceless accounts without any repercussions for their actions, now hitting extremely close to home.
Roots fans have been showing an outpour of support of Njie online. We at the blog would also like to express that we stand with Babou, Oakland will always have your back.