Nashville SC had a trip to forget this past weekend, losing to Charlotte 4-1 Saturday night.
Below are our player ratings.
Each member of the Speedway Soccer crew gives each player that saw the pitch a rating based on their match performance. Below is a quick guideline for our evaluation process.
- A rating of 6 denotes an average performance. Each player starts out with a 6 and their performance either adds or subtracts from that rating.
- Scores are determined after re-watching the match and looking at the stats, and are the averaged total of each Speedway member’s ratings.
Joe Willis – 3.8: Just a tough day in between the posts for Willis, whose defense did him no favors. He only had two saves in six shots faced.
Dan Lovitz – 5.5: Won a tackle but the accuracy on his long balls and corners wasn’t sufficient enough to provide a threat on offense.
Jack Maher – 5.2: Didn’t close down the attacker enough that led to the through ball for the penalty. Was eventually brought off after the first half.
Walker Zimmerman – 5: Had a good look at goal early on in the match from a Randall Leal cross, but skied the volley. Zimmerman’s main contributions were in the opposition box creating chances.
Dave Romney – 4.2: Romney was beaten in the air for Charlotte’s second goal didn’t close down the cross well on the third goal, and got turned inside out for the fourth one outside the box. An uncharacteristically bad day for Nashville’s iron man.
Brian Anunga – 3.7: Committed the foul for the penalty that led to Charlotte’s opening goal that was quite careless, overcommitting to the turn in the box. Was taken off at halftime.
Sean Davis – 5.7: Completed 91% of his passes and won two tackles and 50% of his duels. A decent day in the middle of the park for Davis.
Alex Muyl – 4.8: Wasn’t the most accurate distributor on the night (64%), but did win two tackles and 62% of his duels.
Randall Leal – 5.7: Leal put in some great service into the box with two key passes. He also worked hard winning the ball with three tackles.
Hany Mukhtar – 6.8: Calmly converted his penalty effort and was really excellent in attacking the goal with his shot attempts, but the finishing just wasn’t there for Hany, who finished with an xG of 1.68.
CJ Sapong – 5: No shots at all for Nashville’s number 9. Yes, the holdup play and distribution is decent (two key passes), but Sapong needs to get more involved in making those runs in the box and finding space once he distributes the ball.
SUBS
Teal Bunbury (on ′46) – 4.7: Bunbury had a good look at an equalizer on a near post through ball played by Mukhtar, but his shot deflected off the post. It wasn’t an eye-popping appearance from the sub, but he had some solid opportunities.
Eric Miller (on ′46) – 4.2: Miller let too many off the ball runners behind him in an onside position, which is part of the reason Charlotte scored its third.
Ake Loba (on ’77) – 4.3: Not a ton of touches for Loba, but did complete two passes and a shot. Should he have been introduced to the match a bit earlier? That’s for the Nashville SC Facebook group to debate.
Luke Haakenson (on ′77) – 4: Had one shot and a key pass during his time on the pitch.
Taylor Washington (on ′87) – 4: Picked up a yellow card, but didn’t have enough time to do anything else.
MANAGER
Gary Smith – 3.5: Smith fielded a strong lineup but did not adjust his tactics properly as far as substitutions go. You can still attribute the result to some poor finishing (2.61 xG), but the fact of the matter is that Nashville was poor defensively and have really put themselves behind the eight-ball with their recent stretch of results. Two vital Western Conference home matches with Seattle and new-look LAFC followed by a trip to suddenly-competitive FC Cincinnati now await, where it seems like wins are a must to get back on playoff track.
What say you? Do you agree or disagree with our match ratings? Feel free to reach out to us on Twitter and let us know your thoughts.
