Rowdies hand United a 3-0 defeat

The Tampa Bay Rowdies knocked off Western Conference side New Mexico United 3-0 at Al Lang Stadium, extending their unbeaten start to the season to seven matches. Rowdies forward Cal Jennings notched a brace in the victory, bringing his season tally to six goals.

“We want to entertain the fans when we win games,” said Rowdies Head Coach Robbie Neilson. “We can do that by scoring goals, creating chances. I thought today, we did that. I thought there were a lot of periods in the game where we could have done a little bit more. There are always thing to work on but I was pleased with the guys tonight.”

Tampa Bay was full throttle from the start. Before the first minute had expired, striker Manuel Arteaga had come close to grabbing the lead with a probing long-range effort that did not miss the target by much.

The Rowdies only made the home crowd wait seven minutes before taking the lead. A dangerous corner kick sent in by midfielder Lewis Hilton found the head of center back Forrest Lasso on the back post. Lasso sent his header back across goal where it was met by Jennings. With a few defenders in the area, Jennings bounced on the loose ball with a sliding strike into the back of the net.

“Forrest did a great job beating his defender and I had made a near post run so at that point in time, it was just about recycling,” said Jennings. “He put a nice ball across and the quicker I could get to it, I thought that was most important, not give their defenders the time to react.”

Jennings got a major assist from Arteaga to double the lead in the 16th minute. Pinning the visitors down in their own corner, Arteaga swiped the ball off of the defender and centered a pass for Jennings in the box. Jennings did not waste the chance as he buried the ball with his first touch for his sixth goal of the season.

“The key for us is at the start of the game, we want to play in the opposition’s half,” said Neilson. “That’s really important for us. To get the center halves to the halfway line and play through them. If we do that, we start to create opportunities and then we get the crowd behind us and we start to get momentum.”

Rowdies keeper Jordan Farr kept his squad ahead by two with an outstanding denial of former Rowdies midfielder Dayonn Harris in the 28th minute. A cross sent in from the right flank found Harris in front of goal, but the attacker’s attempt was scooped up on the line at the last second by Farr.

The Rowdies continued to dominate in terms of chances created throughout the first half and eventually found their third goal of the night in the 58th. After being clipped down in the box, Arteaga stepped up to the spot and converted his penalty with a cheeky shot down the middle as keeper Alex Tambakis dove to his left. With the conversion, Arteaga has now scored five goals on the year.

“It was very important for us to win today and get three points at home,” said Arteaga. “Today we were hungry for the win. and everything went well for us. I’ll say it again, the most important thing for us is to win.”

In the second minute of second half added time, Farr again was called on to keep the Rowdies second clean sheet of the season intact. Reading a pass through the middle of the field, Farr came off his line to snuff out a chance for New Mexico’s leading scorer Greg Hurst at the top of the box.

“I think New Mexico are a very good team,” said Neilson. “Attacking wise, they have real pace in wide areas, as you know with Dayonn Harris. They’ve got Akale that comes on and then [Nicky] Hernandez as the 10 and [Greg] Hurts is a top striker. We just felt that we had to keep that back three in place at all times. We really tried to do that get our wingbacks nice and tight as well to stop these phases. I thought the center halves did a great job. They secured everything behind the ball, stopped a lot of the transitions and allowed us to build into the game.”

Next up, the Rowdies head to the Bluff City for a matchup with Memphis 901 FC at AutoZone Park on Saturday, May 4 at 4 pm ET. Join the official Rowdies watch party at Colony Grill in Downtown St. Petersburg.

The Rowdies punished United's defense for another mistake in the 17th minute. Tambakis rolled a soft pass to defender Talen Maples left of the penalty area, where Arteaga blocked Maples' pass attempt and collected the ball. He quickly centered to Jennings for a tap-in goal and a 2-0 lead.

"Entirely our mistake," Quill said.

New Mexico did not have many quality scoring chances, but the visitors did put one together in the 26th minute. Nicky Hernandez crossed a ball to an attacking Dayonn Harris for a one-on-one opportunity in front of the net. But Tampa Bay goalkeeper Jordan Farr managed to get a hand on Harris' low shot and keep it out of the net.

"That was our big opportunity," Quill said. "A goal there could've changed the momentum and gotten us back in the game."

Trailing 2-0 at halftime, Quill changed his team's formation and began pressing more aggressively. The changes seemed to create more chances for United, but the Rowdies got an insurance goal after NMU's Marco Micaletto took Arteaga down in the penalty area in the 56th minute.

Arteaga buried the resulting PK for a comfortable 3-0 lead.

It was United's fourth trip to the Eastern time zone in its first seven matches, and the club was without regulars Harry Swartz and Daniel Bruce, who sustained "soft-tissue" injuries this week. Nonetheless, Quill was dissatisfied with the way his team played Saturday.

"I don't want to make excuses for losing games," he said. "We had a great opportunity to introduce ourselves to a national audience, play New Mexico United soccer and we didn't do that. Just a disappointing performance. Time to watch some unpleasant video, look at ourselves in the mirror and hopefully come out better for it."