Roots fans, despite our best efforts, it is game day once again. Yes, the inevitable press of time has brought game day upon us and there is nothing we can do but watch the game and reset the countdown clock another time. The Roots face Western Conference leaders San Antonio F.C. at 5:30 p.m. Pacific Time at Toyota Park. The game should be on KTVU Plus and ESPN+.
A San Antonio artist with a worryingly timely song!
Around the Western Conference
Part of a four-way tie for 9th place, two points off of Sacramento’s playoff spot (albeit, the two next teams up the table all have a game in hand–Orange County lost to an Eastern Conference team on Friday after I took this screenshot). I mean, honestly it both could and should be worse given Roots’ record, but it’s not. Also no one is running away with this right now, so Roots are still in contention for first! Please don’t laugh.
San Antonio’s Form
Pretty bad! San Antonio got 12 of their first available 12 points, and 4 of their next 12. They have 13 goals in 8 games, but spread their goals around, with only Jorge Hernandez scoring more than 2. With his 4 goals, and generally excellent play, he’s FotMob’s fourth highest rated player in all of USL. Normally I would share highlights from San Antonio’s most recent game here, but it was a 0-0 draw away at Rhode Island F.C. Instead I’ll share their highlights from a 3-2 win over Colorado Springs Switchbacks, where admittedly two of their goals came after Switchbacks got a red card.
None of San Antonio’s goals are particularly convincing.
John Morrissey’s power rankings over at Backheeled, which tend to be a little reactive to recent form, have San Antonio 9th. As he points out, much of San Antonio’s recent bad form was result of Mitch Taintor’s absence, but he was back and now has had a couple of games to settle, which is not ideal for Roots.
Roots’ Form
I left this game extremely mad.
On RootsPod this week I talked myself back into some optimism.
But this was still a very disappointing game. We do not create enough chances and need to figure out ways to create more chances unless our defense can maintain its stinginess from the last several weeks.
I watched the penalty about a dozen times and I don’t know that it could be overturned even if we had VAR. I am not positive Njie actually touches him, but it’s very close, and if he does touch him as it appears he touches him then I think it’s a pen.
Lineup and Score Predictions
Bloom
The Sacramento match was not Bobosi’s best, which is bound to happen, but he was one of our standout players in the two wins. Hackshaw has been much better than he was to start the season and Bravo is essentially a must-start as the left centerback. I think Jon has the lineup basically correct below. I would start Rasmussen over Njie, who I continue to be flummoxed by.
Roots currently do not play like they want the ball, and San Antonio don’t either, but San Antonio will see Roots as a team they need to beat in San Antonio, so the Roots should be able to make San Antonio come to them. The Roots will be looking to try to force dangerous turnovers and counterattack. It might work.
Roots have never beaten San Antonio and while, as mentioned above, I have talked myself into some optimism about this team, I don’t think they win in San Antonio.
Or draw.
Jon
I’m going with no changes from the most recent starting lineup. Although I’d like to see a lineup that features Panos Armenakas and Jose Luis Sinisterra at the same time, that would likely mean you have to take out one of Tyler Gibson, Bobosi Byaruhanga, or Julian Bravo—which I’m having a difficult time doing based on their current form.
1-nil, Roots win.
Aaron
What a wild week, huh? I think genuinely too many things happened this week, most of them Bad.1 I’m ready to wind down, crack open a cold one, and enjoy some quality soccer to recharge my batteries ahead of next week’s horrors. As of the time of writing, I’m looking forward to Bournemouth-Villa, and Atletico-La Real. On an unrelated note, Roots are also playing today.
Just joshing, I’m actually pretty optimistic. I think Roots will show up for this one. There’s still plenty of quality in this side, they could just use a few bounces. Here’s hoping they get them. 3-2 Oakland.
- The following is a sampling of the week’s events: (1) the epic second leg of Inter-Barca, (2) Steph Curry’s injury, (3) Chicago pope, (4) a declassified intelligence memo was released undermining the administration’s public claims that there is coordination between the Venezuelan government and Tren de Aragua, undoing any conceivable justification for invoking the Alien Enemies Act (none existed in the first place) or, as they are now floating, suspending habeas corpus (not something they can do on their own anyway), (5) the outrageous immigration raid in Worcester in which a supine local police department, which had publicly pledged not to support ICE’s efforts in its community, decided to run interference for a grab bag of federal LEOs, including one of them saying, reportedly, “they’re federal, they don’t need a warrant” (FYI, the warrant requirements, which come from the 4th Amendment, apply equally to federal law enforcement), (6) we learned that the president intends to send a new batch of immigrants (of unknown status) to Libya, (7) the Supreme Court permitted the transgender military ban to go into effect, (8) the firing of the librarian of congress, (9) the (likely unlawful) firing of every democratic member of the consumer product safety commission, (10) the arrest of the mayor of Newark for “trespassing on federal property” when he tried to serve notice of code violations at a private prison, and (11) the retirement of former Raiders QB Derek Carr. ↩︎