- Location: Ottawa
- Attendance: 4,327
- Final Score: 4-2
- Starting XI: Nicht, Franco, Norales, Miller, Hyland, Mares, Smart, Wojcik, Richards, Pineda, Rugg
- Substitutions: Janicki 62' (Wojcik), Brown 68' (Richards), McKinney 77' (Franco)
- Unused: Cardona, Keller
- Goals: Smart 33'; McKinney 90'+(assist Brown)
- Bookings: Smart 13' (Yellow), Hyland 16' (Yellow), Miller 34', 89' (Yellow/Yellow->Red)
- Adage goals: One - 35th minute
This is one of those games I don't want to write about and I'm sure the team wants to forget about too. So I'm going to get it out of my system today and move onto waiting for Saturday when the Cosmos come to The Mike. There's no pleasant way to say it. The team looked horrible. There were good moments throughout, but I can't think of a single player who sticks out as having a good game despite themselves. If any Indy Eleven player makes it onto this week's NASL Team of the Week, somebody is getting paid off by the Eleven front office.
Cory Miller. The thing that fans love about him when he's playing well is his tenacity and that he plays with abandon. However, sometimes that abandon causes him to play on the edge of getting fouls and, by extension, cards. Today was one of those days. His second card was not smart and probably a function of continually playing on that edge.
Nicht looked like he was playing with his legs stuck in concrete. He literally stood immobile and watched Heinemann defeat two of his defenders on a long ball and then stood there rooted to the spot when Heinemann shot on goal. He made absolutely no play on the ball. With some of the saves we've seen him make this season, at least fall over and make it look like you've made an effort.
Set piece defense was horrendous. The wall didn't even attempt an effort of stopping the Ryan free kick in the 35th minute. Everybody watched it go over the wall and into the back of the net. I'm calling it now that the second free kick in the 65th minute will be one of the NASL Plays of the Week. However, despite it being well struck, it should have been one that Nicht stopped. It seemed like he didn't place himself properly to defend it as a result of not trusting his wall to do their job and shading too far towards the middle.
Pineda missed a PK and it wasn't even close.
So that we don't all feel completely disappointed by this game, Dane Richards and Judson McKinney made their Eleven debuts and McKinney tallies his first goal. Don Smart got a start and a rocket of a goal, despite being 25 yards out with four defenders around him. McKinney's late 90'+ minute goal came off a header redirection from second half substitute Brown. The goal was important because #EveryPointMatters. Like I stated in my "What If?" post, every goal matters, and the McKinney goal in the 90'+ minute kept the Eleven from dropping one more spot in both the Fall and Combined standings.
They didn't get the point, but the second goal kept them a little closer to the top of the table and this early in the Fall Season, that's the silver lining of a really bad game.
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