A calm night in the mountains leads to match 100
Forward Madison went to Colorado to face the Northern Colorado Hailstorm for the final time this regular season. We were treated to another football lines evening of soccer. Well one team was interested in playing soccer while the other was playing some other sport that was not soccer. The game started a bit slower with both teams making half efforts and trying to catch the other on a counter but then a soft penalty call as Madison was defending a corner allowed NoCo to take an early lead. Madison would recover though as Andrew Wheeler-Omiunu put in a long ball to Derek Gebhard, who was driving forward, Gebhard then was able to put the NoCo defender on skates and score in the far post to even up the game. Madison would enjoy a spell of possession and when they were starting an attack, NoCo defender Leo Folla came in hot with a slide tackle that caught AWO and resulted in a red card.
The second half began and Madison was beginning to start knocking on the door. Matheus Cassini took an attempt from long range that hit the post and Abdou Mbacke-Thiam was close as well but a good save from the NoCo keeper stopped it. Madison would get the breakthrough when Cassini put in a long ball that Cyrus Rad was able to head across the box where Jeremiah Streng was able to tap it in. That would be Rad’s 5th assist of the season which leads the team.
Despite being up a man and a goal, Forward was hoping to kill the game off which they would get in the 82 minute. Cassini would get a ball to Streng who had a beautiful heel flick to get the ball forward and would have him 1v1 against the keeper and bury it.
NoCo would continue to implode with two additional red cards in a four minute span that can only be categorized as frustration was the nail in the coffin for the Hailstorm
What did we learn?
- Last week I said Gebhard needed to keep his place in the squad and he did over in the right wing back area filling in for Alvin Jones who had gotten hurt with his equalizing goal. Once again, he is undroppable at the moment
- Madison was able to have its attacking options return with Cassini in the starting lineup and Nazeem Bartman on the bench. Keeping them healthy and available is going to be vital during this final push.
- Shoutout to Cyrus Rad once again was shifted to a left wing back role after some substitutions, which I think is more showing Glaeser potentially tinkering with a potential back four tactical switch during matches.
- Madison ended their season series against NoCo with two wins and a draw in three matches.
- Madison now has a better road record this season in 11 games than they did all of last year in 14 matches.
NCFC Preview
When NDZ took their web hiatus to work on the print version, Forward Madison had their first encounter with North Carolina FC. These two teams played on August 10 in Cary where Madison succumbed to a last minute winner after going down to 10 men. NCFC are in their second year of being in USL League One and after their bottom of the table 2021, they were hoping to improve and take that next step. Youth is still the main core of the roster but have added some more veteran presence in Jordan Skelton, and Max Flick. Garrett McLaughlin is their biggest threat with the striker scoring 10 goals this season; however Forward Madison will need to make sure that if Oalex Anderson plays that they can better handle him. Anderson came on as a sub at halftime and his directness troubled Madison’s right side of the defense and won a penalty. Despite their slump of form, one win in their last 10 matches, this young team has enough attacking capability to spring a surprise.
This is also Forward Madison’s 100 match. That is an impressive feat for any Lower League club to accomplish especially when you throw a global pandemic in the mix. To see the growth from Madison Pro Soccer to 100 matches in four years has been fantastic to witness and here’s hoping for hundreds of more matches. Make sure to stay a little after as the club has a special plan.
