As a journalist covering a sporting event, my job is to report to the audience what happened in a game. A ball was on the pitch for 90 minutes as 22 players ran around, sometimes scoring goals for various teams, so obviously something happened that I need to report on. Which is why I feel so guilty writing that nothing really happened in the Chicago Red Stars’ 2-1 victory over the Houston Dash on Sunday afternoon. Because, as you’ll see, nothing happened.
In the first half, the biggest play was a clear foul on Vanessa DiBernardo inside the box that happened in just the 5th minute. Studs were up and into the leg, but the game played on. Veronica Latsko had a half-chance in the 9th minute on the corner of the box that went wide of the goal without much effort. Probably the Red Stars’ best real chance at goal was in the 19th minute when a bad touch from Mallory Pugh led to a bad touch from a defender, leading to Pugh getting back on the ball for a weak shot wide of the net as the goalkeeper failed to even move from her spot. That was the level of play that was on display in this match..
A goal was finally scored in the 62nd minute when Houston dashed forward on a counter. Still in her own third, Jasmyne Spencer drew Sarah Woldmoe into a poorly executed desperation tackle and drove past the midfield and into the final third, where she attempted to lay the ball off to Latsko. The pass wasn’t very accurate to begin with, but with the help of a poorly timed clearance from Kayla Sharples, the ball ended up landing in front of Latsko anyway for the shot at goal.
But somehow the game ended 2-1. And the reason for that wasn’t an explosion of scoring from the Chicago Red Stars, but a defensive implosion from the Houston Dash. In the 73rd minute, a freekick off the corner of the box was headed beautifully into the back of the net by Shea Groom, a Dash player. This situation was made all the more confusing as a cross to what looked to be no one in particular from Morgan Gautrat was sent straight past Lindsey Harris by former Red Star Katie Naughton. This made it two separate own goals scored by the Houston Dash and the game ended 2-1.
Here are three things to take away from this match.
Getting Things Right
The only real storyline to take from this game is the continued head-scratching being done at NWSL officiating. Not only was the play in the 5th minute not even glanced at, but a later handball in the Houston box was left uncalled. In fact, the Chicago Red Stars were called out on handballs throughout the game, yet the one that was let go was one that would’ve helped the Red Stars. But this isn’t about NWSL officials systematically keeping down Chicago. This has been a growing issue all season.
Red Stars coach Rory Dames once again spoke about this issue after the match, citing those handballs, the DiBernardo foul, and even Danielle Colaprico’s first yellow in the Racing Louisville match. He mentions that he can’t be too angry at these refs because this isn’t their full-time job, but he says that there needs to be more consistency at this level of the game for the way things are being called and there needs to be a transparent amount of accountability when these calls go wrong.
Legendary Striker, Owen Goal
I’ve stated in the past how much I love chaos and trashy soccer. This game, while not exactly the fun kind of trash, did have some level of chaos coming in the form of two own goals. In fact, the last three goals that the Chicago Red Stars have “scored” have been own goals. Their only three goals in the last four games have been own goals. Their leading goal-scorer is the legendary striker “Owen Goal”.
This is not how you build momentum. This is not how you win games. With the amount of talent that is on this roster, it just feels so wrong that they’ve now relied on Katie Naughton to score more goals for them than Katie Johnson, who has made an appearance in all nine regular season games without a single goal scored. It brings me to my next point.
Wins That Feel Like Losses
I don’t know how anyone can feel good about this game. I don’t know how anyone could feel good about their last game. But they’ve won two in a row and have propped themselves up into fifth place. Maybe there’s something happening around the entire league as the Chicago Red Stars’ last two opponents haven’t fully shown up, but the Red Stars haven’t either. Teams are missing key players for the Olympics, but it wasn’t this bad for the World Cup back in 2019.
If any player leaves this game feeling like they’ve won, they need to rewatch the match. Because the scorelines of the last two matches have been extremely forgiving for the Red Stars. They need to look at their lack of pressing and attacking movement, their lack of creativity in the midfield, and the lack of communication in the defense. These used to be small problems that have now been amplified by more and more poor performances and things need to change.