The following words have never been said in reference to Union Omaha: The Owls began their USL 1 campaign with a loss.
That loss came in humbling fashion at the hands of Greenville Triumph in front of 1,611 fans last Wednesday night—one of them being Ronaldinho, now a member of the Greenville Triumph ownership group. The 3-0 scoreline would have made the Brazilian legend proud, even if it was almost completely against the run of gameplay for those 90 minutes.
Dominic Casciato’s first lineup of the year came as a big surprise to a lot of people, though we would find out some of the reasons why later with injuries to Lagos Kunga and Rashid Nuhu announced after the match day squad was released. The bigger surprise seemed to be the move from a 3-4-3 construct to a 4-2-3-1 with new arrival Mehdi Ouamri as the tip of the spear and Russell Shealy handling the goal with Shido out. Coach Dom also opted to take the experience of former Minnesota United and Nashville SC defender Brent Kallman in a center back pairing with Blake Malone with one of last year’s defensive standouts, Marco Milanese, ready to come in off the bench.
Rick Wright chose the same formation with stalwart Brandon Fricke anchoring the defense and holding the armband. With golden boot and USL 1 player of the year winner Lyam MacKinnon now in Orange County, Coach Wright placed an always dangerous Leo Castro up top with Ben Zakowski supporting an attack that was held mostly mute in their opener against Westchester SC.
The warning signs were unfortunately there from almost the opening kickoff, with Greenville sending a long ball looking for Connor Evans up the right side. The pass itself was well over everyone’s head, but for some reason Shealy decided to try to slide over and try to play the ball. Instead of a Union Omaha goal kick, the ball fumbled off the keeper and out for a corner kick. Though that would be dealt with well, it was the kind of mental lapse that would plague the Owls all night.
But things weren’t all bad in the opening, as Omaha dominated most of the possession and attacking chances. Except for a well-worked, but easily claimed header off of Leo Castro, the momentum was pretty much all in the visitors’ direction. As if to punctuate that dominance, almost immediately off that claimed header, Brent started the most dangerous attack of the early match.
The 11th minute saw the defender find Mehdi splitting the middle of the Triumph defense just on the right side of the penalty area. Mehid pushed the ball off to Kemi Amiche who switched play well to find Aarón Gómez on the left side. With the Greenville defense doing well to collapse, Aarón found Charlie Ostrem who fired a first-time cross off his left foot toward the 6-yard box. Triumph keeper Rankenburg appeared to misjudge the ball and ended up weakly flailing at the pass. The ball fell perfectly for Kemi, and with Rankenburg out of position, Kemi fired a rocket toward an open goal. Open, except for the foot of Fricke who cleared the ball off the line. A scramble almost saw Kemi have a chance for a put-back, but the Tyler Polak’s risky (but well-timed) tackle meant only a corner kick on which the Owls wouldn’t be able to capitalize.
Just two minutes later, another very dangerous attack started off of some great pressing play by Aaròn and Dion Acoff. Dion, having lost possession on the attacking right, followed the ball as Greenville passed it back to Zane Bubb in an attempt to get some room to clear. With Dion bearing down, Bubb flicked a pass over to D.J. Benton. Benton turned and tried to put the ball upfield, but didn’t realize how close Aarón was to the play. The pass ended up hitting Aarón square in the chest and falling for him in stride just outside the penalty box. Bubb did well to recover and cut off any dribbling angle which forced Aarón to fire off his shot quickly. With no time to put power or placement on the shot, his attempt rolled somewhat harmlessly back to Rankenburg.
Despite the dominance in attack, that was to be the Owls’ last shot on target for the rest of the match.
As the early stages of the match wore on, it seemed that despite Union Omaha’s lack of finishing, Greenville would be the team more in trouble. That thought was backed up in the 21st minute when midfielder Pascal Corvino came up hobbling off the ball. The non-contact injury would force Coach Wright into an early change and add to the early season injury woes that have bothered the Triumph so far.
But just when you might think Greenville were up against the odds, an extremely unlikely goal would manifest not 15 minutes later. Dion had pushed the ball up the right wing and sent a beautiful cross in to Brandon Knapp that would’ve given Rankenburg trouble had Brandon’s shot not been blocked by Benton. The ensuing counter attack saw Evans loft a ball up the right side looking for Castro. An indecisive Russell started to come out and sweep the ball away, only for him to realize he wouldn’t make it in time. With Blake screaming for him to get back, Castro took the chance to chip the ball over the wrongly positioned keeper for the opening score of the match.
That proved to be the turning point in the match, but it wasn’t the end to the defensive woes. Just before halftime another lapse led to the second Greenville goal. Following a foul by Brandon on the left side, Polak stepped up to take a free kick from just inside the Omaha half. A hopeful ball found it’s way to Castro’s head over Blake’s leaping effort. The ball flicked on to a streaking Zakowski as Brent noticed the Triumph man too late to be able to put him off receiving the ball. A volley straight of Zakowski’s left foot found the top corner in a place where Russell had no chance to save it.
Halftime brought a needed relief to a shell-shocked team that were looking for anything to help them get back into the game. To help pick them up, Coach Dom brought on USL 1 Finals MVP Joe Gallardo in place of Isidro Martínez. Unfortunately, the hope that the masked man could swoop in and save the day was quickly put to rest after the restart.
With their first bit of possession, Greenville worked the ball through the midfield, stringing together several good passes and shuffling around the Búho midfield. Eventually, the ball made its way out to Zakowski on the left side about 15 yards out. A perfectly placed ball found Castro again as he split between Blake and Brent in the box. Castro’s header again gave Shealy no chance to stop the bleeding.
While Union Omaha did have some chances flash across the face of goal, and one really good individual effort by Aarón go just wide of the post (thanks to an intervention by Benton), there wasn’t a lot to get excited about in the final 45 minutes. Greenville ceded the majority of possession (to the tune of 29% possession in the second half), but still found themselves unlucky not to have a fourth goal. Were it not for a very close offside call, Zakowski would have given it to them.
As the time ticked away, it became more and more apparent that the belt would be on its way to Greenville, and when the whistle finally sounded on the match, it seemed the end of a mere formality.
The Good:
There were some serious moments of quality, especially in the first half. The passing, especially from the back line, more often than not found its target. Brent Kallman had 58 accurate passes, and 4 of those went into the final third. Charlie Ostrem had 7 accurate passes into the final third. Blake and Dion added 6 and 4, respectively, and the four had a passing accuracy over 80% on the night.
There were also flashes of brilliance, notably the shots by Kemi and the pressing of Aarón that led to the best chances of the night. The team dominated almost all the usually relevant stats and were really unlucky to have gotten the goal that probably would’ve changed the face of the match.
Finally, the fact that they did all of this with new players, in a new formation, and on the road speaks to the potential that this team has. There are a lot of things to take away that are promising.
The Bad:
There’s also a lot to take away that’s not as promising.
First has to be the mental, positioning, and communication lapses that led to Greenville’s best scoring chances. The biggest one is, of course, Russell’s inexplicable indecision on a ball that Blake had covered, even if Castro was slightly behind him. Blake had the inside and was forcing Castro to the wing outside the box with hardly any other support for a cross. I’m not sure if Russell is used to playing those balls, or if he hasn’t developed the trust in his back line that Shido has, but that’s going to have to change quickly if Shido starts to miss more time.
There’s also Brent’s positioning on Zakowski’s goal, a tendency to bunch up for our midfielders, and a lot of times where a player had pushed up but had no support for a dangerous cross. Things seemed really off there.
There was also the trend of players trying to take on too much, especially on the dribble. As I was watching initially, I remember thinking that it seemed like the new players were trying to make their mark or announce themselves by going it alone and beating two, three, sometimes four players off the dribble. It reminded me a lot of Lagos last year when he struggled—he was overthinking things and trying too hard. His best work came when he got his confidence and communication with the supporting players right.
And to validate my thoughts, here are some of the stats on dribbling:
Kemi Amiche – 7 dribbles, 1 successful
Charlie Ostrem – 3 dribbles, 1 successful
Joe Gallardo – 3 dribbles, 0 successful
Union Omaha Total – 19 dribbles, 4 successful
But probably the most damning thing I saw had nothing to do with stats. The first goal seemed to completely deflate the team. They were still trying, but the body language said the unit morale was gone. It also seemed like there wasn’t a presence on the pitch capable of bringing them out of it. There were occasions where it looked like Dion tried to live up to the captain’s armband, but it just didn’t come off. Dion’s a great player, and he can lead by example with his play, but he didn’t show to be a rallying force. Nor did Brent. Blake showed the potential, but he’s also not there yet.
If we can’t fix that very major problem, we’re going to find ourselves a sinking ship without a true captain.
What’s Next:
Union Omaha get a quick second to regroup before heading out to Golden, Colorado to take on USL 2 side Flatirons FC on the campus of the Colorado School of Mines. The match will be Thursday, March 20, at 8 pm Central Time.
After that we have to wait another 9 days as the Búhos travel to Statesboro to take on a very attack-minded South Georgia Tormenta team. A disappointing 2-4 loss to Richmond Kickers was followed up with a 2-0 defeat of expansion AV Alta FC, showing the Ibises have some striking power when needed. Kickoff in that one is Saturday, March 29, at 6 pm Central Time.
Interesting Facts:
- The last time Union Omaha lost a match by this scoreline was July 22, 2023 at Lexington SC. In fact, that was the last time that the score was 3-0 against the Owls at any point in a match. They only followed that up with a 23-match unbeaten run in all competitions (including a PK defeat in the 2023 playoffs that technically counts as a draw).
- This is the 5th time in their history that Union Omaha has lost a match 3-0, and it equals the worst defeat they’ve suffered to peer competition.
- However, had Zakowski’s goal been allowed to stand, it would have marked the first time EVER the Owls had given up 4 goal to a USL 1 opponent. Instead, Union Omaha has to live with this being the 9th time in their history they’ve given up 3 goals to USL 1 opposition. They’ve lost 6 of those matches and drawn 2—the only win being a 4-3 slugfest against North Carolina FC on September 6, 2023.
- According to g+ GameFlow (@gameflow.bsky.social), Castro’s first goal was massively against the run of play…as in at the time of the goal the Max Possession Value Difference was at a 0.275 in Union Omaha’s favor (see graphic below).
- Oh, and one more for optimism. The team that Union Omaha beat to start the 23-match unbeaten run mentioned earlier – South Georgia Tormenta. Hmm…who was it we play next in the league?
Key Events:
Greenville Triumph Sub: 23’ – Pascal Corvino OFF; Carlos Anguiano ON (Injury)
Greenville Triumph Goal: 36’ – Leonardo Castro (1st) (A: Connor Evans – 1st) (1-0)
Greenville Triumph Goal: 45’ – Benjamin Zakowski (1st) (A: Leonardo Castro – 1st) (2-0)
Union Omaha Yellow Card: 45’+4’ – Mehdi Ouamri (Bad Challenge – 1st)
Greenville Triumph Yellow Card: 45’+5’ – Tyler Polak (Tactical Foul – 1st)
Union Omaha Sub: 45’ – Isidro Martínez OFF; Joe Gallardo ON
Greenville Triumph Goal: 47’ – Leonardo Castro (2nd) (A: Benjamin Zakowski – 1st) (3-0)
Union Omaha Sub: 65’ – Brandon Knapp OFF; Prosper Kasim ON
Greenville Triumph Yellow Card: 67’ – Leonardo Castro (Bad Challenge – 1st)
Union Omaha Yellow Card: 73’ – Blake Malone (Pulling Back Opponent – 1st)
Greenville Triumph Sub: 75’ – Evan Lee OFF; Anthony Patti ON
Union Omaha Subs: 77’ – Mehdi Ouamri OFF; Mark Bronnik ON
– Dion Acoff OFF; Ryen Jiba ON
Greenville Triumph Yellow Card: 82’ – Zane Bubb (Kicking Ball Away – 2nd)
Greenville Triumph Yellow Card: 84’ – Anthony Patti (Pulling Down Opponent – 1st)
Greenville Triumph Sub: 87’ – Leonardo Castro OFF; Ivan Agyaakwah ON
Who Gives A Hoot? 
Good article.
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