BIRMINGHAM, Ala. – The bounces just did not go Birmingham Legion FC’s way on Sunday night, as the squad suffered a 1-0 defeat to Indy Eleven. A first half penalty kick goal ultimately decided the outcome, with the visiting team extending its USL Championship-leading winning streak to seven games, while the home side is left wondering what could’ve been.
“You create your own luck,” said Legion FC coach Tom Soehn. “We were in their box more than they were in ours and we didn’t create our own luck, so it’s definitely disappointing, but we have to learn how to win those games.”
The penalty occurred in the 34th minute when an unlucky bounce in the box found the arm of Legion FC midfielder Jake Rufe for a penalty. Indy’s Jack Blake slotted the ensuing spot-kick in the lower right corner for the game’s lone goal.
“I’m going to have to chop off my arm before next game I think,” Rufe said of the penalty call. “The bicycle kick attempt was such a mishit that the ball quickly spun towards me. I tried to put my hand behind my back, but that’s when it made contact.”
It was Blake’s fifth penalty converted in USLC play this season, which leads the league.
In playing with the lead, Indy was content on sitting back and absorbing pressure for the rest of the match, but Birmingham nearly broke through and salvaged a point in the fifth of six allotted minutes of second half stoppage time.
Recycling a cross that went through the box, substitute Preston Tabort-Etaka gathered the ball on the right-hand side and dribbled through a pair of defenders before firing a shot that beat goalkeeper Hunter Sulte, but, ultimately, not the crossbar. The ball bounced a couple inches in front of the goal line before Indy cleared the ball out of danger and secured the three points.
“I thought we got ourselves in good spots,” Soehn said. “But we didn’t bury our chances and that comes back to haunt you because they don’t give up a lot. In the end, if you don’t put those chances away and you get what we got tonight.”
Legion FC looked sharp in the opening 25 minutes, completing 91.3-percent of its first 150 passes of the match, with 92 of those passes occurring on the opposition’s side of the field.
The first shot on target from either side came in the 21st minute with Tyler Pasher threading a pass between three Indy defenders to Prosper Kasim just outside the box. The Ghanaian forward turned and fired off his left foot, forcing Sulte to push the shot over the bar.
“We created enough chances,” said Enzo Martinez who led Legion FC with three shots and four touches in the opponent’s box. “I had some that I should’ve done better with to give the team a chance. We played well in a lot of parts but we just couldn’t get the result.”
Like Sulte, Birmingham goalkeeper Matt Van Oekel was just as impenetrable with eight saves on the night. None bigger than a sequence in the 71st minute in which he got the best of Blake this time by pushing a ball wide only to go right to the feet of Indy’s Ben Mines. However, the Legion FC goalkeeper was up to the task yet again with a second save in quick succession to keep the deficit at one.
Van Oekel answered the bell with five second saves as the Eleven would push the ball on the counter with Legion FC pushing numbers up on the other end in search of an equalizer that just was never able to materialize.
“The defense is giving us a chance in every game,” Martinez said of a Birmingham defense that hasn’t allowed more than one goal in each of its last five matches. “Last week, we were able to score three goals, this week we didn’t. Hopefully we can continue to keep this same level at the back and try and get a goal early to make the game totally different in how it’s played.”
In the second half, Legion FC out-possessed Indy Eleven 62 to 38-percent with 25 more entries into the final third, but were unable to record a shot on target.
“We scouted them and knew they were going to that,” Soehn said of Indy’s low block. “I don’t think we did a real good job with our transitions in stretching the backline early on. Hopefully, we’ll get a better understanding of that and if we face a team like that again, we’ll do better to beat it.”
Match Details
| BOX SCORE | 1ST HALF | 2ND HALF | FINAL |
| IND (8W – 4L – 2D) | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| BHM (5W – 5L – 3D) | 0 | 0 | 0 |
LINEUPS
IND: Sulte – GK, Diz (O’Brien 70′), Chapman-Page, Ofeimu, Lindley – C, Stanley, Mines, Blake (Gibson 80′), Guenzatti, Williams (Collier 80′), Martinez (Wootton 45′)
BHM: Van Oekel – GK, Paterson (Pinho 76′), Kavita – C, Crognale, Dodson, Rufe (Tabort Etaka 60′), Hernandez-Foster, McCartney, Pasher (Perez 60′), Martinez, Kasim
GOALS
IND: Blake 34′ (Penalty)
BHM:
DISCIPLINE
IND:
BHM:
NEXT UP
Legion FC’s gets 10 days off before returning to Protective Stadium on Wednesday, June 19 for a matchup with San Antonio FC. It will be only the second time this season that Birmingham plays consecutive matches on its home field. Tickets for this special Juneteenth match can be purchased HERE.
