Time to strap on the shootin’ boots
Westchester SC vs Forward Madison FC | The Stadium at Memorial Field | 6 pm | ESPN Select
Forward Madison are in Westchester County, New York, looking to bag three big points in the race for a home playoff match (or two), and to get some momentum rolling into the off-season.
The last time these two teams met, on August 1 at Breese Stevens Field, Madison came away with a 2-0 win on goals from Hakim Karamoko and Stephen Annor Gyamfi, along with another Karamoko goal that was judged (incorrectly, in my view) offside and a curler from Joshua Bolma that clanged off the crossbar.
Lest we take too much confidence from that result, let’s remember Westchester played most of that match down a man, as Bobby Pierre managed to pick up two yellow cards in the first 20 minutes.
Still, the Mingos dominated from start to finish, and would have even had Westchester had its full squad on the field.
That was Madison’s sixth consecutive win and the last match of our nine-game unbeaten streak, as we fell 2-1 in Boise a week later. Since then, Madison has stagnated a bit; they went unbeaten in another seven, but those seven matches included four draws, and that streak was followed by our first home loss, 1-0 to Spokane and a 0-0 draw at Fort Wayne.
Meanwhile, Westchester haven’t gotten any worse, but haven’t gotten any better, either; they’ve won three, lost four (including that absurd 5-4 result in Charlotte) and drawn two.
For the second consecutive year, Westchester could very well end the season as one of the league’s worst teams but win a golden boot. Last year, it was J.C. Obregon taking the goal scoring title before moving up to second-division Brooklyn FC; this year it’s Conor McGlynn, whose 15 goals leads the pack.
So, to win tonight, Madison needs to keep McGlynn quiet. Westchester’s second-leading scorer is Dean Guezen with seven and just behind him is Jonathan Jimenez with six. This club just doesn’t pack a lot of offensive punch outside of McGlynn. And Madison’s done a pretty fair job this year of identifying and neutralizing opponents’ strongest scoring threats.
The other thing Madison needs to do to win is score some gall dern goals. That’s been our refrain since this podcast launched in 2021: Madison is good at creating chances and terrible at finishing them.
In the nine-game league unbeaten streak leading up to and including that 2-0 win over Westcheser on August 1, Madison scored 24 goals, plus four more in the USL Cup win over Union Omaha. That’s 28 goals in 10 games in all competitions, a 2.8 goals per game clip. Since then, they’ve tallied 15 in 12 games — a modest 1.25 goals per game average.
That is a massive difference, and the key stat in why we’re just hoping to cling to third place rather than competing for the Player’s Shield right now.
Fort Wayne was the first USL League One team to earn a clean sheet against us this season, and has to be the last. And we need to figure out a way to put up a crooked number. One goal may well be enough to beat Westchester, but it likely won’t be enough to win a playoff match. So we need to find our shooting boots tonight.
Exactly how to do that is above my pay grade. But I think I’ve seen some hesitation in some of our strikers of late, looking to make one more pass instead of having a hit. And we’ve had too many of those last passes intercepted by defenders who know they have to be locked in against us. And we still can’t break down a low block — when we’re building up in that patient, deliberate manner Matt Glaeser teaches, defending teams have a chance to settle in, and then our off-ball movement just … stops. We’re not seeing creative diagonal runs, line-breaking through balls or accurate crosses. We’re just knocking it around the outside of the box, hoping to earn a corner.
So, unless we can get more creative in those situations, we need to see some lightning in transition moments, and/or some chances created on the press and counter press forcing defensive turnovers (to which Westchester is very vulnerable). We need some killer instinct in those high leverage moments.
Here are the other matches we’re keeping an eye on
Forward Madison sits in third place on the table, now well out of the race for the Players’ Shield but still very much in the hunt for a top-four finish and a home playoff game — the stated goals at the beginning of the season.
With Boise three points behind us, we can’t technically clinch a top-four finish tonight, even if we win and they lose to Omaha. If both of those results go our way, we’d be ahead by six with two games left to play, meaning they could still catch up to us. If we win and they lost tonight, and then we lost our last two and they won their last two, we’d be tied on points and on total wins – the first tiebreaker. But to get past us, they’d have to win their last two games by a combined margin of something like 18 or 19 goals (or hope we lose our last two games by a similar margin). While mathematically possible, that seems unlikely. So, a win tonight for us coupled with a Fort Wayne loss to Omaha pretty much guarantees us a top four finish.
Of course, at first glance, it looks like that Omaha win would also eliminate us from any possibility of winning the Player’s Shield, as it would keep them nine points clear of us with just two matches to play. But in reality we’re already out of that race; even in the unlikely event that we win our last three and they lose their last three, we’d be tied on points but still behind on wins.
We’ll also keep half an eye on Charlotte, who are hosting the lowly Cosmos. If the Cosmos can pull off that upset, and we beat Westchester, then a second place finish — and two guaranteed home playoff matches — would remain within reach. I don’t see that happening, though.
While you await kickoff, listen to this week’s podcast
For the first time this year, we have to do a podcast about a zero zero draw. But don’t worry! We have plenty to talk about other than the game. Ethan made the trip to Fort Wayne, and has lots to say about the experience. Plus, John Morrisey of USL Tactics joins the show to share what he’s seen in Forward Madison’s performance, what it’ll take to make it in the playoffs and what Championship sides you should be watching.
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