The Roots’ offensive woes continued on Sunday, September 29, as the Oakland team failed to score for the fourth consecutive match and FC Tulsa won 1-0 at Pioneer Stadium in Hayward.
The visitors got on the board early, when Tulsa’s Stefan Stojanovic sent a low cross from the right side of Oakland’s penalty area in front of the net, finding an unmarked man in Aaron Bibout who leisurely put the ball into the net to give his side a lead.
Oakland tried to bounce back following the goal, and looked better for the remainder of the half, but couldn’t generate any truly threatening offensive pressure.
During the second half, the Roots’ locked down on defense for the most part and came close to leveling the match on a few occasions, but their scoring drought continued and Tulsa FC emerged victorious at the final whistle.
The Roots will look to turn things around as the playoff push becomes more critical with each game.
The Oakland Roots will head to Tennessee for their next USL Championship contest, taking on Memphis 901 FC on Saturday, October 5, and will return home for their second-to-last home match, facing Phoenix Rising FC on Saturday, October 12, at Pioneer Stadium in Hayward.
Talking with the Head Coach
After the loss, Head Coach Gavin Glinton was asked what has caused the Roots to go without winning—or even scoring—for the entire month of September.
“We haven’t brought the energy and the commitment that we’ve needed to earn the right to play the game,” Coach Glinton said. “Losing a lot of second balls frustrated our defending, just the initial battle that you need to have as a baseline to be able to play this game.”
Glinton continued to say that the team’s commitment to winning simply hasn’t been good enough. “Scoring goals and defending goals is about tactics, but it’s also about heart, commitment, and effort—making sure that you don’t let a guy free, and making sure that you create the space to get in. There’s no hiding from it right now, we’ve got to make sure that we’re looking to win the battles before we do anything else, and then we can start to talk about the quality, which we also need to improve on.”
Noting that the energy hasn’t seemed there like it was during the team’s previous good stretch—high pressing, getting the ball back, really committing to challenging—the coach was asked for his takeaways.
“We’ve talked about trying to be aggressive, trying to make teams play on the back foot and get in their end, and we looked at resting and making sure that we have enough energy to come into these games,” Coach Glinton said. “And you know, it’s been sadly missing for the last few, so right now it’s about finding the rhythm of players who are going to get us three points in Memphis, and that’s all the focus is.”
Summary
Scoring:
- TUL: Aaron Bibout 7’
Discipline:
- TUL: Aaron Bibout 45’+ (yellow)
- OAK: Dom Dwyer 74’ (yellow)
- OAK: Gagi Margvelashvili 75’ (yellow)
- TUL: Diogo Pacheco 76’ (yellow)
- TUL: Owen Damm 78’ (yellow)
- TUL: Alexis Souahy 87’ (yellow)
Oakland Roots SC
Lineup: Paul Blanchette, Justin Rasmussen, Niall Logue (Irakoze Donasiyano), Gagi Margvelashvili, Memo Diaz, Rafael Baca (Miche-Naider Chéry), Camden Riley, Johnny Rodriguez, Daniel Gomez (Ali Elmasnaouy), José Luis Sinisterra (Trayvone Reid), Dom Dwyer (Baboucarr Njie)
Unused subs: Etsgar Cruz, Ilya Alekseev, Thomas Camier, Timothy Syrel
Line: Shots: 11 | Shots On Goal: 5 | Corner Kicks: 4 | Fouls: 15 | Offside: 5
FC Tulsa
Lineup: Johan Peñaranda, Patrick Seagrist, Bradley Bourgeois, Owen Damm, Harvey St Clair (Arthur Rogers), Alexis Souahy, Boubacar Diallo, Andrew Booth (Sebastian Sanchez), Milo Yosef (Diogo Pacheco), Aaron Bibout (Faysal Bettache), Stefan Stojanovic (Alexander Dalou)
Unused subs: Michael Creek, Rashid Tetteh
Line: Shots: 7 | Shots On Goal: 3 | Corner Kicks: 2 | Fouls: 21 | Offside: 4