Oakland Roots have been bound to come back down to Earth, cratering back to reality in a 5-0 loss to the Pittsburgh Riverhounds.
If Gavin Glinton’s Roots were due for a set back, Bob Lilley’s Riverhounds were far overdue success. The ‘Hounds had been held scoreless in their previous six matches, before the Roots defense opened early and often for the 2023 Player’s Shield winners. The chances were consistent, and the conversion was reminiscent of last year’s regular season—ruthless.
Beginning with Junior Etou’s goal in the 12th minute, Pittsburgh dominated wire-to-wire in the worst loss in Roots’ history1. The Riverhounds recorded 12 shots to Oakland’s two, neither of which were on target despite controlling 64 percent of possession. Both shots for the visitors were from outside of the box, while Pittsburgh worked their way between the Oakland lines for good opportunities all night.
Paul Blanchette summarized the team’s frustrations when he threw his gloves, and his shoes, and then more shoes, after the final goal went in2. The turf at Highmark was unfriendly, but the tensions were boiling over for more reasons than slipping.
It was a cagey match out of the gate with Roots playing lots of long balls and happy to let Pittsburgh control possession, but momentum changed with some possible miscommunication between center backs Cam Riley and Neveal Hackshaw.
In the buildup, Hackshaw headed a ball across the middle following a desperation kick by Emmanuel Johnson, expecting Riley to be there. But the former Pacific Tiger was wider than Hackshaw anticipated, allowing Riverhounds’ captain Robbie Mertz to read the misplay perfectly and glide through Roots’ defense. Mertz played a ball to the center of the Roots penalty area to Bradley Sample, who found Etou making a lung busting run for the goal.
Junior Etou, who scored the final goal in the 69th minute as well, dominated the wide left area for the home side, but Pittsburgh’s commanded the game from all over the pitch. The midfield trio of Mertz, Sample, and Jackson Wälti were impossible to play through, while the Riverhounds comfortably controlled the ball from touchline to touchline. The team’s heatmap shows how dominant they were all over the field.
While Roots were doomed to move the ball from side to side with little progression, the whole Highmark Stadium field was available for the home side. Despite having little of the ball over the 90 minutes, Pittsburgh bullied Oakland centrally and outworked them out wide.
The Roots badly missed starting fullbacks Memo Diaz and Justin Rasmussen, while Dom Dwyer was once again not available as a substitute. Bryan Tamacas played in place of Diaz, and the El Salvador international struggled. Tamacas’ nightmare game and another Dwyer-less night highlighted the glaring problem recent success has overshadowed: the players signed to be top contributors are not producing.
Glinton has reshaped the Roots in a way that has them playing better than the sum of their parts, but, for the first time head coach, Glinton was not able to conjure adjustments that affected the game. Roots couldn’t produce after halftime, which has been a hallmark of the Glinton era thus far, and the team grew visibly frustrated with their inability to play through Pittsburgh.
Memo has been phenomenal and constantly improving during his tenure in Oakland, but it was surprising to see the drop-off in performance with the former El Salvador captain Tamacas playing in his stead. He finished with the game’s worst rating on FotMob with a 4.6 after giving up the handball penalty.
Striker Miche-Naider Chéry made his third straight start but he and Oakland’s attack struggled to break down or go around the Riverhounds’ rigid backline, evident in Saturday’s heat map. Chéry generated Roots’ only shot attempt from open play in the 89th minute.
Chéry and Oakland’s lack of offensive output put emphasis on the substitute list being without Dwyer–requiring the Haitian and Johnny Rodriguez to play all 90 minutes. With a struggling attack, nothing seems more helpful than a healthy veteran striker like Dwyer, who seems to be the second-half super sub mold ala Jeremy Bokila.
The team’s continued improvement, and staying in the top half of the Western Conference will require less meltdowns and better performances from the top-end of Roots’ payroll.
- Sean Suber’s goal, the match’s third, was the most annoying to me. Halftime around the corner and a train coming into view, I took a big exhale as the Riverhounds lined up a free kick. ↩︎
- Blanchette picked up a yellow card in the first half, seemingly for running his mouth. And in fairness here he needed a shoe change for some reason, but I was in pure shock when he wasn’t sent off for this. Whatta goalkeeper. ↩︎