Tampa Bay Rowdies 1-3 Charleston Battery: Rowdies downward spiral continuing

The First Half was rock bottom...or so it seems

Charleston completed a regular season sweep of Tampa Bay with a 3-1 victory in St Petersburg on Saturday night. With the three early Charleston goals, Tampa Bay conceded a total of EIGHT goals in less than 90 minutes of competitive football between minute 32 in the 0-5 midweek Open Cup loss to Orlando and tonight’s first 29 minutes.

The Rowdies performance against Orlando City looked worse on the eye than many matches I’ve seen where professional teams play amateur teams in competitive matches (this is NOT hyperbole. I am totally serious) - so pathetic was that performance, it felt like the Rowdies had to do better tonight. But they did not. In fact the first 30 minutes tonight were worse than any stanza during Orlando City match.

Just over a month ago, Tampa Bay could rightly have felt hard done in a 2-1 loss to Charleston - a match which was Robbie Neilson’s final as Rowdies manager. A farcical penalty call on Blake Bodily was the difference that day at Patriots Point. Neilson lost his job after that match which was even outside of the dodgy pen. Whatever the circumstances of Neilson’s sacking, it must be said the Rowdies have looked for much of the time since, a shattered and rather disinterested side. In addition to being an injury-prone squad whose fitness even in matches often looks decidedly second-best.

By contrast, Charleston who probably needed the win more in the previous meeting than Tampa Bay, has not dropped a USL Championship point since (though they did lose in extra time midweek to DC United in Open Cup and stunningly lost to FC Naples in USL Jägermeister Cup) and strolled through this match as if it was simply an advanced training session at times.

Tonight Woobens Pacius who once again started on the bench (not quite sure why) scored a deserved goal when the Rowdies after several substitutions and reversion to a more obvious tactical shape given their personal showed some spirit. But the truth told, the match was done long before halftime.

In the first half the only spirit the Rowdies showed was Laurence Wyke’s indiscipline which which flared up AFTER he had conceded a penalty on a clumsy foul in defending Arturo Rodriguez.

MD Myers was especially influential playing in his now familiar playmaker/withdrawn striker role (is he a 10 or a 9 1/2?) and between him and Cal Jennings, the Battery look every bit as potent as last season.

The match was one-sided prior to Ben Pirmann’s decision to take off Jennings in minute 60- but the insertion of Rubio Rubin for Jennings served to stifle the dynamism and fluidity we had seen from Battery until that point (Now it’s obvious to me why Rubin who I once rated highly was without a club until recently) .

Back to the Rowdies- it’s pretty clear the 4-4-2 does not work with this personnel who likely were signed to play in a 3-4-3 or similar formation. Aaron Guilen has been a great servant for the club but cannot play leftback. Playing Blake Bodily in a four-man back line is a waste of one of the best attacking wide players in the USL Championship. So you either should start Joey Skinner or revert to three-at-the-back.

Nick Moon dressed today but did not get a run out - the first half injury to Pacifique Niyogabirie (who is not a right back btw) did not lead to Moon’s insertion which makes me wonder if he is still nursing an injury himself. I have been wanting Nate Worth to get more playing time, but tonight he was lousy, though no worse than anyone else in Rowdies first XI outside of Ollie Bassett who I thought was quite good.

Where the Rowdies go from here is anyone’s guess. Here are some thoughts on that.

• Lewis Hilton remains injured and I believe a midfield trio of Hilton with Cammy MacPherson and Danny Crisostomo would be among the most formidable in the USL Championship. But outside of that, even a fully fit Rowdies squad has too many questions.

• Manuel Arteaga does not appear capable of the leading-the-line in a 4-4-2 or in a situation where he doesn’t have a complimentary partner. I thought Robbie Nielson’s idea of a front 3 of Bassett, Arteaga and Pacius was right - though it leaves the club with little cover. But my next point may in fact make that lack of cover moot.

• It’s hard to start wanting to ride a 17-year old, but Endri Mustali quite frankly has shown me more in his late match appearances the last month than Arteaga has starting in any match this season.

• The back-line is a mess and the decision to start Wyke ahead of Robert Castellanos tonight proved disastrous. Again maybe reverting a three-man backline helps solve some of this.

• Joey Skinner as noted above probably should get a match or two in the coming weeks - could he really do worse than Guillen has at left-back?

In summary, this Rowdies side is alarmingly poor at the moment. And this is especially striking since the Rowdies have arguably been the best club in the USL Championship over the previous five seasons with the exception of LouCity and Sacramento (although like both those clubs, they have not won a title in that period, but the playoffs are a crapshoot so I don’t obsesses over those results- I look at consistency). A turnaround will come in some manner because quite frankly, Tampa Bay cannot possibly get any worse than they are at the moment.