{"id":33039,"date":"2021-05-01T23:50:58","date_gmt":"2021-05-02T03:50:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/?p=33039"},"modified":"2021-05-02T00:32:18","modified_gmt":"2021-05-02T04:32:18","slug":"austin-fc-clean-sheet-minnesota","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/2021\/05\/01\/austin-fc-clean-sheet-minnesota\/","title":{"rendered":"The First Austin FC Clean Sheet Leads to win in Minnesota"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>ST. PAUL, MN<\/strong> &#8211; Good teams win when they play well. Great teams win when they don\u2019t. It&#8217;s far too early to label Austin FC a great team, but they certainly have something about them. Austin FC didn\u2019t play badly during their first-ever visit to Allianz Field, but it wasn\u2019t quite the free-flowing attack witnessed in the second half against Colorado last weekend. Instead, they had to demonstrate patience, discipline, and some real grit. In doing so, they were able to make the most of their 16th-minute lead, carrying it through to the final whistle against Minnesota United. It led to the first ever Austin FC clean sheet.<\/p>\n<h2>Another First: Austin FC Clean Sheet Leads to Another Road win<\/h2>\n<p>Jared Stroud was again the architect of ATX\u2019s opening goal, bending in a cross from the right-wing. Diego Fagundez was the lucky recipient, just as he had been in Colorado. He tucked away the opportunity with similar aplomb. Austin created several other great chances in the first half and again in the second. Hoesen, Stroud, Gallagher, Ring, and Redes with the pick of the bunch; no one quite able to match Fagundez\u2019s clinical finishing.<\/p>\n<p>Minnesota United crafted several decent chances of their own, but were only able to put two on-target the entire night. Brad Stuver fashioned a \u2018Wonder Wall\u2019 of his own, refusing to give up the first clean sheet in the club\u2019s history. He was helped in no small measure by his determined defense, chief among them Jhohan Roma\u00f1a.<\/p>\n<p>The young Colombian, playing only his 3<sup>rd<\/sup> MLS match, threw himself in front of everything, thwarting the dangerous Emanuel Reynoso and, later, Patrick Weah. The teenager, son of former Ballon d\u2019Or winner George Weah, posed a real attacking threat when he entered the game late on. Roma\u00f1a and co were equal to the challenge, securing another precious Verde victory.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">He did it again. \ud83e\udd29<br \/>\nShoutout to <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/JollyJ_Tweets?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@JollyJ_Tweets<\/a> for that pass! <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/STPA5t53DX\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/STPA5t53DX<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Austin FC (@AustinFC) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AustinFC\/status\/1388652188109508610?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">May 2, 2021<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Skipper Alex Ring acknowledged the difficulty of the task. \u201cWhen you didn\u2019t kill off the game, you\u2019re going to have to deal with pressure like that. But in games like this where we prevail, this is going to take us further. But the message is we take our chances and kill games off sooner.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Coach Josh Wolff was happy overall with his team\u2019s performance, though shared Ring\u2019s assessment on taking their chances. \u201cI think we could\u2019ve been one or two more goals up at the break, and we obviously had great chances late on.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Wolff was particularly impressed by his team\u2019s spirit this evening. \u201cWhat I\u2019m most proud of is the guy\u2019s ability to grind. It\u2019s hard on the road, and we have 8 games on the road to start our season. It\u2019s only going to get more challenging as we play some of these other teams we have coming up. So, I\u2019m really proud to get the 3 points but really proud to pitch a shut-out in Minnesota which isn\u2019t easy to do. I think we deserved the win coming here and playing the way we played and creating the opportunities we did.\u201d<\/p>\n<h3>Three Key Takeaways:<\/h3>\n<p><strong>Stuver is Steadfast:<\/strong>\u00a0A determined display\u00a0by the ATX defense made all the difference, and goalkeeper Brad Stuver deserved his and the clubs first-ever Verde clean sheet<\/p>\n<p><strong>Finish better to finish earlier:<\/strong>\u00a0That they are creating\u00a0chances is cause for celebration. Not finishing more of them is cause for concern, though. In particular, attackers Danny Hoesen and Jon Gallagher will feel better once they finally get off the scoring mark.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Fagundez forces his way into the starting XI, and the fans&#8217; hearts:<\/strong>\u00a0First-ever Austin FC goal last week. Game-winning goal this week. Diego Fagundez is fast becoming a fan-favorite, as well as an important cog in the Verde midfield machine.<\/p>\n<h3>Last Word:<\/h3>\n<p>With two wins from their opening three games, all on the road, Austin FC has to be pleased with that return. With another 4\u00a0consecutive\u00a0road games to go before ATX finally gets\u00a0to play their home opener, the Verde are going to have to continue to dig deep to earn every point.<\/p>\n<p><em>Photo courtesy of Austin FC. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>ST. PAUL, MN &#8211; Good teams win when they play well. Great teams win when they don\u2019t. It&#8217;s far too early to label Austin FC a great team, but they certainly have something about them. Austin FC didn\u2019t play badly during their first-ever visit to Allianz Field, but it wasn\u2019t quite the free-flowing attack witnessed [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1894,"featured_media":33053,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3114,67,119],"tags":[1137,244,4250,3115],"class_list":["post-33039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-austin-fc","category-minnesota-united","category-mls","tag-alex-ring","tag-diego-fagundez","tag-jhohan-romana","tag-josh-wolff"],"modified_by":"Matt Pollard","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33039","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1894"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33039"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33039\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/soccer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}