It’s not every day a team drops three goals on Pittsburgh Riverhounds SC. In fact, the Tampa Bay Rowdies are only the second team in the last three years to post more than two goals in a match against the Riverhounds. Ex-Riverhounds Steevan Dos Santos kicked the Rowdies off with a first-half goal and continued to showcase why the Rowdies brought him into the squad the rest of the night by being a constant threat to his former team.
The Rowdies expected a tight match from Pittsburgh as usual, and they got just that for the first hour or so until Sebastian Guenzatti and Jordan Adebayo-Smith put Pittsburgh in a three-goal hole.
“A lot of very good performances tonight across the board,” Rowdies Head Coach Neill Collins said. “It was a team performance. You can see the front two/three working together and the back three working well together. That was definitely a team performance. That’s the only way to beat a team like Pittsburgh, for everyone to be on the same page.”
Collins and his staff know this is not the time to get carried away with two lopsided results, especially considering the Rowdies still have to face the Riverhounds three more times this year as Atlantic Division counterparts. This year’s regular season format sees every team playing each team in its division twice at home and twice away. Only the top four teams in each division will make the postseason.
In 2020, the Rowdies beat the Charleston Battery handedly in the first meeting between the two sides only to drop the next three. The grind is only going to get tougher as the pace of the schedule increases over the summer and the Rowdies start seeing teams for the third or fourth time. Pittsburgh will more than likely find its form in the next month or so and be even more formidable in their home stadium.
In the immediate future, it doesn’t get any easier next week with Phoenix Rising FC coming to town. The defending Western Conference winners have started the season in almost identical fashion as the Rowdies, securing a 4-1 win and 3-0 in their first two outings.
“Confidence should be very high,” said Collins. “I think the good thing is we’ve got good experienced players that will know we’ve got a very tough challenge coming up next. We’re so fortunate to have had the game tonight against a team that’s going to be challenging us all the way. Now we’ve got another team we expect to be challenging at the top of any standings. The lads should enjoy the day off and then come back in ready to go.”
Sturdy Start
The Rowdies effectively neutralized Pittsburgh’s attack on Saturday. Keeper Evan Louro only had one shot come his way, a dipping free kick from 20 yards out he managed to tip over the bar.
Midfielder Kenardo Forbes, who is the USL Championship’s all-time assist leader, was hardly heard from in the match. Newcomer Alex Dixon also had a quiet night apart from a breakaway opportunity in the 68th minute, which Rowdies defender Jordan Scarlett snuffed out with an incredible recovery sprint down the field and sliding tackle in the box.
“I think when you score three goals the strikers take plaudits, but when you look back at those moments of the game, that’s what those center backs are there for,” Collins said of Scarlett’s stop. “If they do that consistently, that’s when they get the plaudits. They’ve started with two clean sheets and as you add those, those moments add up. I’m really pleased Jordan made that intervention. That’s life being a defender, you’ve gotta do that at important times in the game and he did that tonight.”
All three center backs put in resolute shifts. Scarlett, Forrest Lasso, and Aaron Guillen combined to win 21 duels, with 12 of those being aerial duels. They will need bring that same tenacity next Saturday against the firepower Phoenix boasts.
You Never Forget Your First
Jordan Adebayo-Smith hasn’t even played 20 minutes for the Rowdies, yet the 20-year-old attacker already has his first goal for the Green and Gold.
Five minutes after entering the match for Steevan Dos Santos, Adebayo-Smith took advantage of some sloppy play from Pittsburgh and sealed the match. A long header from Lasso from inside the Rowdies’ own half bounced over Adebayo-Smith’s head at first, but he kept pursuing the ball as it made its way into Pittsburgh’s box. Mekeil Williams and keeper Danny Vitiello were slow to react and secure the ball, so Adebayo-Smith pounced and poked the ball away before slotting it into the goal.
“It’s a great feeling to get my first goal for the Rowdies,” said Adebayo-Smith. “Neill talks a lot about the substitutes making an impact and giving a real energy, especially in the last 15 or 20 minutes of the game. That’s when other teams get tired. We get even more energized, pushing each other toward the last minutes of the game. We showed that with the goal, chasing everything down and trying to be a threat all the time.”
