Oakland’s offensive woes continued on Sunday afternoon in the East Bay, as Roots failed to score for the fourth consecutive match, and visiting FC Tulsa emerged victorious in an 0-1 contest.
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 looked to bounce back following the goal, and looked better for the remainder of the half, but couldn’t generate any truly threatening offensive pressure.
This lackluster performance continued through the second half as well, and despite Roots locking down on defense for the most part, and coming close to leveling the match on a few late occasions, the scoring drought continued and Tulsa FC emerged victorious at the final whistle.
Oakland will look to turn things around in short order as the playoff push becomes more perilous by the game. Roots now head to Tennessee for their next USL Championship contest to take on Memphis 901 FC on Oct. 5th, and will return to the East Bay for their second-to-last home match to host Phoenix Rising FC on Saturday, Oct. 12th.
Talking with Head Coach Gavin Glinton
Okay, Gavin, another tough loss. Haven’t won in all of September, haven’t scored, what do you think has gone wrong in this stretch?
Yeah, I think from a first standpoint, we haven’t brought the energy and the commitment that we’ve needed to earn the right to play the game. 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. Before we start talking about passing and receiving and that stuff, just the commitment hasn’t been good enough, a little bit. And then when we talk about the details, our ability to circulate and create chances and get on the end of chances. Scoring goals is the toughest thing in football. Scoring goals, and defending goals is where it’s 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.
The energy hasn’t seemed there like during that good stretch — high pressing, getting the ball back, really committing to challenging. What are your takeaways?
I mean, you said it. 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. 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.
Oakland Roots SC vs FC Tulsa
USL Championship | September 29, 2024
Venue: Pioneer Stadium, Cal State University East Bay, Hayward, California
Kickoff: 3:00 PM PT
Weather: 71 degrees, sunny
SCORELINE:
OAK: 0
TUL: 1
SCORING SUMMARY:
TUL: Aaron Bibout 7’
DISCIPLINE SUMMARY:
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 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
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
Shots: 7 | Shots On Goal: 3 | Corner Kicks: 2 | Fouls: 21 | Offside: 4 |
