After a week that saw more games played than any other week so far this season (not only did all 12 teams play, but all 12 played just during the weekend alone) I figured we were bound to see some wonkiness in the ratings. Not to mention, some teams reached that 8 match milestone as well. All in all, the league itself was pretty wild this past week. For example, do you realize the Jake McGuire punt into the stands in Greenville was less than a week ago as of the publication of this post? My goodness, a lot has happened. Let’s look at the updated ratings first, and then look straight away at each team’s movement.

Rank	Team	Rating
1	Union Omaha (5-3-1)	2.413
2	Chattanooga Red Wolves (5-1-1)	1.357
3	Greenville Triumph (5-1-2)	1.034
4	Forward Madison (3-3-2)	0.717
5	Richmond Kickers (3-3-3)	0.632
6	Toronto FC II (2-4-3)	0.300
7	North Texas SC (3-2-3)	0.243
8	New England Revolution II (3-1-4)	0.033
9	FC Tucson (2-3-3)	-0.036
10	Fort Lauderdale CF (4-2-6)	-0.326
11	South Georgia Tormenta (5-0-6)	-0.381
12	North Carolina FC (0-1-6)	-1.759

Team	Result(s)	Change
Toronto	D 2-2 @ FTL W 2-1 vs. FTL	🔼 0.846
New England	W 2-0 @ MAD	🔼 0.809
Tucson	D 0-0 @ NTX	🔼 0.464
Tormenta	W 3-1 vs. GVL	🔼 0.319
North Carolina	L 1-2 @ GVL L 2-3 @ CRW	🔼 0.114
Richmond	D 1-1 v. OMA	🔼 0.101
Omaha	D 1-1 @ RIC	🔼 0.054
Chattanooga	W 3-2 vs. NC	🔽 0.071
Fort Lauderdale	D 2-2 vs. TFC L 1-2 @ TFC	🔽 0.077
North Texas	D 0-0 vs. TUC	🔽 0.138
Greenville	W 2-1 vs. NC L 1-3 @ TRM	🔽 0.368
Madison	L 0-2 vs. NE	🔽 0.554

The most surprising results of the week were obviously Tormenta’s win against Greenville and New England’s win at Madison (both by two goals), so it’s no surprise that Greenville and Madison dropped the most this week. What’s a little more surprising is that Tormenta’s rise wasn’t as high as I thought it would be. Especially comparing them to Toronto, who rocketed up from their results this past week, but Toronto got to drop their worst result (a home loss to Tucson) and that gave them an additional boost.

Another slight surprise might be the fact that NCFC’s rating actually improved slightly. This is easy to explain; their rating was already so low, and losing two matches (away from Cary, the Rome of the American Southeast) by one goal to two of the three best teams in the league obviously shouldn’t lead to that big of a penalty when you’re already the worst team in the league. The results are also legitimately on par for them, they have lost all six of their matches by one goal this season.

Team positions in the middle of the table are starting to become very volatile, because the difference in ratings are so small. Seeing Tormenta still in 11th place might be frustrating given their current form, but they have made up much more ground than you might realize. It’s interesting looking at the gaps between each team, when you simply compare their rating versus that of the highest rated team. To do this, you can add the absolute value of the lowest rated team (which is NCFC this week, and perhaps in perpetuity) to each team’s rating and then calculate their proportion versus the highest rated team. Here is what that looks like at the moment:

Team	% Of Top
Omaha	100%
Chattanooga	74.69%
Greenville	66.94%
Madison	59.34%
Richmond	57.31%
Toronto	49.34%
North Texas	47.97%
New England	42.93%
Tucson	41.29%
Fort Lauderdale	34.33%
Tormenta	33.02%
North Carolina	0%

I think this table helps truly interpret the gaps between each team. Notice that it shows the gap between 1-2 is the same as the gap between 4-11. It might not be correct to say the gap between Omaha and Chattanooga is the same as the gap between Madison and Tormenta. In fact, I know it’s not. Omaha is going to have to continue with some really impressive results to maintain this level of separation, especially since they’re going to be playing at home more often. But it does help you realize just how close some of these teams are to one another, even if their separation by rank alone is great.

All of the above is perhaps evidence that supports releasing these ratings less often. But screw that, because content, baby! [Editor’s Note: YEAAAHHHHH!] Plus there are some big matches this week, with three of the top four teams playing three matches against each other (poor Greenville). I’m also going to start tinkering with how predictive these ratings can be, but that will take time and patience. I will update you if I feel comfortable with any of my findings. Until then, let the bantz and hot takes begin! Or not, you know, whatever.

Union Omaha is back on the road and find themselves in Richmond, Virginia for a Week 11 matchup against Richmond Kickers.  Kickoff is scheduled for 5:30P CST and the match will air on ESPN+, so make sure to tune in and watch this quality matchup.

            These two clubs have only faced each other once in the past.  That previous match was last year, when Richmond came to Werner Park and left with a 2-0 win. Today’s match will be the first time Union Omaha has played against Richmond in City Stadium.

            So far in 2021, Richmond has equaled Union Omaha’s eight matches played, yet finds themselves six points behind the Owls.  Entering Week 11, Richmond is in seventh place and on the outside of the playoff picture.  With a quarter of the season completed, Richmond will need to pick up more points if they want to compete for the league title.  That quest begins tonight when Union Omaha comes to town.

            The Kickers have had a strong season so far in 2021, allowing only seven goals scored against them in eight matches.  Goalkeeper Akira Fitzgerald has the most clean sheets and is making a strong case for the Golden Glove award at the end of the season.  On the other side of the field, Richmond has shown themselves to be a threatening chance-creator.  Midfielders Zacarías Morán Correa and Nil Vinyals have been especially potent on offense.  Forward Emiliano Terzaghi has taken a different stride this season.  After scoring 10 of Richmond’s 22 goals last season, winning the Golden Boot, and USL Most Valuable Player of the year, Terzaghi has shown that he can be a prolific team player.  He’s scored the most goals for the club this season and has an assist to his name (editors note: his first in League One), but he’s been sharing the ball a lot, creating a valuable partnership with teammates Oalex Anderson and Nil Vinyals.  This effort has resulted in Richmond utilizing multiple weapons in their arsenal.  Defenses have had a harder time covering all of the threats the Kickers have to offer.  It’s a tall task for Union Omaha, but they’re riding a solid wave at the moment.

            The Owls are coming off a historic performance from Greg Hurst, who earned his first hat trick of his career.  The hat trick was also the first for Union Omaha.  With Evan Conway injured, other players have had to step up a fill the void he leaves behind.  The team has responded in the best way possible to Conway’s injury: as a team.  Sure, individuals have stepped up and earned praise for their individual performances, but the team has gelled together, blending their talents, and manufacturing an offense that is multi-faceted and balanced.  Missing Conway has sure affected the team, but the players united to make sure the team is still in a good place for whenever he is well enough to return.  Greg Hurst has collaborated with Conor Doyle, Nick Firimino, Dami Viader, and Ferrety Sousa, among many others, to create a different style of offense.  That style has paid off, as the team currently sits in first place, has only one loss this season, and has the largest goal differential.  Though the team has changed their formula with each team they face, they’ve found a way to make the formula work and gain success.  That success will be difficult to find against Richmond.

            The Kickers are a defensively-sound team.  No doubt about it.  One key to success in Virginia is going to be isolating the midfield.  Like Omaha, they have a strong midfield that connects well with the frontline.  If Omaha can load the middle third of the field, disrupt the passing lanes, and prevent them from settling into a stream of possession, Omaha will have a much greater chance of winning three points at the end of the day.  Possession will be a big factor because Richmond is a very creative team and their offense is cerebral.  It’s dangerous to allow them time and space, so the Owls could do that by pressuring early and forcing them to play one and two-touch passes.  It’s a lot more difficult to find that long through ball, cross-field switch, or the simple ball to the outside if you know there’s a defender that will be getting physical with you after your first touch.

            This will be a defensive match, but both sides also have quality offenses to showcase, so look for quality soccer on both ends of the field.  The match could be a low-scoring affair, but having Greg Hurst on your side certainly gives you confidence to continue littering the goal with shots.  It would not be surprising to this match go to the wire.  Both teams are hungry and want those three points.  This could be one of those matches that the clubs will look back on and wish they had found a result.  One of those matches where those three points would travel a lot farther at the end of the season.  All in all, this will be a fun one to watch.

            We know you’re hungry for more Union Omaha soccer news, but hold off on your Antonio Rudiger impressions around us at the tailgates and watch parties.  We’re working hard to get all of you the best content from Who Gives A Hoot Media, so keep checking the website and we’ll give you quality podcasts, ELO rating updates, data breakdowns, and other articles to fill your time.  Don’t forget to find us on social media, where you’ll be able to see videos from events, memes, and so much more.

Over the course of this season many USL Championship and League One teams have been recognizing the milestone achievements of their players making appearances wearing that club’s shirt. Dallas Jaye for Greenville is one example of a player that hit an appearance milestone, not only for Greenville, but for all of League One.

This got me thinking about the short history of our beloved club and how many matches some of our boys have played. The next closest milestone for appearances would be 25 total appearances (either as a starter or as a sub) so I took some time to research who was close to hitting this achievement.

The only players I focused on were those that have played for Union Omaha during both seasons so, unfortunately, Greg Hurst (hat-trick hero and currently on fire), Connor Doyle, and others will not make an appearance on this list. That left me with 13 players to focus on.

As you can see from the table above, we have a handful of players that are less than 5 games away from playing their 25th match in a Union Omaha shirt. A few things that jumped out at me:

1. Devin Boyce will make his 25th appearance on Saturday. I said on twitter that Devin went from “who the hell is this guy?” to “why in the hell isn’t he starting?” in a very short period of time. This number jumped out at me because Devin has been so consistent and such a boost of energy that we recognize when he isn’t on the pitch. He is also the ONLY player for Union Omaha to appear in every single match we’ve played. Hell of an achievement.
2. EVD is only 2 appearances away from 25. His start to this season made me feel like he hasn’t played much this season. If we’re talking strictly minutes, that may be true, but for appearances starting every game last season and appearing in 7 of the 8 this season has boosted his number up.
3. Rashid Nuhu is our rock in the back. Rashid’s only two non-appearances came because of a red card in 2020 and for rest during a long road stretch, otherwise he has been between the pipes for every other match. The man is a beast and deserves to be celebrated when he hits 25.
4. Elma Nfor being 4 away from 25 surprised me only because Elma doesn’t get the opportunity to start very often. He’s racked up his tallies in this category with his bottled chaos sub appearances but is very close to hitting this milestone as well.
5. Finally I wanted to give love to three players that worked their butts off to become mainstays in our starting 11. JP, Daltyn, and Sousa are all guys we’ve talked about on the pod who worked their way into these positions and their appearances show this. Those three had some bumps during the beginning of last season before making regular appearances and have not missed a game this season, leaving them close to 25.

As the season continues, let’s all keep an eye on this milestone as these players continue to add to their appearances and work towards other milestones. I for one will be celebrating Devin on Saturday as the first player to appear in a competitive match in a Union Omaha jersey 25 times. Here’s to many more!

If “Greg Hurst is on fire” isn’t still ringing in your ears or running through your head, are you really living right? While it is VERY tempting to give the hat trick hero all three bullet points in this column, I’m going to restrain myself. Somehow, other interesting things happened as well in the game against Revs II, so let’s dive in.

1) Greg Hurst is the poacher we’ve been missing

Who could have predicted that Greg Hurst would return home from a six game road trip and score a hat trick. Oh wait….

Bringing back this cringe-filled moment of my past today, as I foresee a @GregHurst10 hat trick tonight. #VivaBúhos https://t.co/LVlaHZlJsL

— Connor (@Connor_Husen) June 12, 2021

So Greg Hurst has scored 5 goals so far this season. 4 of them have been at home. 2 of them have won games against NE Revs II. 3 of them have been unassisted. 2 of them have been scored off of turnovers he’s forced. This seems like what a goal poacher would be doing, creating something out of nothing.

Another thing I noticed about this game is that Greg’s second goal had an xG of 0.45 which is the highest xG we’ve had on a chance all year.

g+ GameFlow: USL League One Regular Season @Union_Omaha v @NERevolution2 on June 12, 2021. #UpTheOwls #NERevsII #OMAvNER

Originally tweeted by GameFlow (@GameFlowxPG) on June 13, 2021.

Greg seems to be very skilled at turning small openings into goals. In fact he is the best in the league at it right now. According to the wonderful folks at American Soccer Analysis, Greg’s season xG is 2.52 (roughly equivalent to Dami’s expected assists at 2.53), but he has scored 5 goals. Thus his Goals minus Expected Goals is 2.48, good for first place in the league.

2) Did Devin Boyce really play forward?

Saturday saw the revival of one of Jay’s crazier personnel schemes from 2020 and one of my favorite: Devin Boyce as a forward. While definitely not his position, the reckless abandon with which Devin plays suits itself well for playing up top in our system, especially against teams that insist on playing out of the back.

The benefits were there for Devin and the team. A great goal to kill the game off and allow the home fans a chance to enjoy the end of the game. And, tired of his joint first status on the club’s all-time game winning assist leaderboard, a game winning assist to take sole possession of 1st place.

Last weekend, Jay started Emir up top, and it sure looked like he didn’t really play up top. So let’s check in on Devin and see if he played up top.

Sure looks like he played forward, but let’s look at a heat map for confirmation.

Interesting, all of a sudden I’m less convinced because to me that looks like Devin was just playing both wings equally. Let’s look at Evan’s heat map against Fort Lauderdale to get a better sense of what a true forward might be doing.

Evan seems to be playing on both sides of the field like Devin, but Devin seems to be playing closer to the sideline like you might expect from his role as a midfielder. I think we’ll give this one to him and say he did great at the forward spot. I have no complaints!

3) Opponents crosses

I have concerns about our defense. We’ve allowed 4 of the 6 total goals we’ve allowed this season in the last 3 games (at TFC2, at Madison, Revs II), 3 in the last 2. When it comes to expected goals, in those 3 game, our opponents xG was 2.63, in the last two games it was 1.35. Not a great sign or trend. Is this a real problem, is this regression to the mean, all valid questions but all for a different column for a different day.

Today I’d like to highlight a pretty crazy statistic. Of the 23 crosses attempted by Revs II, they completed ZERO of them.

You love to see if from our guys, and hope they can replicate that success in Richmond on Saturday.

An average to below average score for most of the group last week. I say most of the group because Luke had to go out and do the thing. While he’s not out of the cellar quite yet, he has mentioned that his goal was to always finish strong. Somebody needs to tell him we’re about a quarter of the way through the season, so let’s not get too crazy tapping most of our mana right now.

I’m sorry for the cross-sport reference here, but I’m comparing Liam’s current position to the position of that one college football team that has numerous losses, but are still ranked way, way too high in the polls. So, Liam is essentially like Texas A&M or Michigan at the moment. Let’s see if he’s going to right the ship and end up like a typical Oregon team, or if he’s going to sink the ship, and be like that USC team that somehow ends up ranked after winning a bowl game to finish 8-5.

	Ben	Jon	Liam	Luke	Rich	Riley	Ryan
Toronto 0-1 Tormenta	0 pts	0 pts	0 pts	0 pts	0 pts	0 pts	0 pts
Madison 0-0 Richmond	0 pts	0 pts	0 pts	0 pts	2 pts	0 pts	0 pts
Omaha 4-2 New England	1 pt	1 pt	1 pt	1 pt	1 pt	1 pt	1 pt
Tucson 2-3 Chattanooga	1 pt	0 pts	0 pts	0 pts	1 pt	1 pt	1 pt
North Texas 3-0 Greenville	0 pts	1 pt	0 pts	1 pt	0 pts	0 pts	0 pts
Tormenta 1-0 Toronto	0 pts	1 pt	3 pts	3 pts	0 pts	0 pts	0 pts
Total	2 pts	3 pts	4 pts	5 pts	4 pts	2 pts	2 pts

	Record	Points
Ryan	20-24	33
Jon	20-24	32
Liam	15-29	29
Rich	19-25	28
Riley	16-28	27
Ben	14-30	17
Luke	13-31	15

	Ben	Jon	Liam	Luke	Rich	Riley	Ryan
Greenville Triumph v. North Carolina FC (Wednesday, 18:00)	1-0	3-0	2-0	1-1 🏝	2-0	3-0	2-0
Fort Lauderdale CF v. Toronto FC II (Wednesday, 18:30)	3-2	2-1	1-0	2-1	2-1	2-0	1-1 🏝
Richmond Kickers v. Union Omaha (Saturday, 17:30)	1-2	1-2	1-1 🏝	0-1	0-1	0-2	0-2
Toronto FC II v. Fort Lauderdale CF (Saturday, 18:00)	2-1	1-1	2-1	1-1	1-1	1-3 🏝	2-2
Forward Madison v. New England Revolution II (Saturday, 19:00)	1-1	2-1	2-1	0-1	1-0	2-2	1-2
South Georgia Tormenta v. Greenville Triumph (Saturday, 19:00)	0-3	1-1	1-2	1-1	1-1	1-3	0-1
North Texas SC v. FC Tucson (Saturday, 19:30)	4-0	3-1	1-0	2-0	2-0	3-1	2-0
Chattanooga Red Wolves v. North Carolina FC (Sunday, 18:00)	3-1	2-1	2-1	1-0	2-0	1-1 🏝	2-1

So, even though I waited until we were practically two months from the start of the season to release these ratings for the first time, I still had a feeling that at this stage of the season we’d see some wonky movement that seemed to go against the grain. And while, surprisingly, most of the things I mentioned in the “look ahead” portion of last week’s post sorta came to fruition, there were still some unexpected results. Let’s take a look at the current ratings before we dive in:

Rank	Team	Rating
1	Union Omaha (5-2-1)	2.467
2	Chattanooga Red Wolves (4-1-1)	1.428
3	Greenville Triumph (4-1-1)	1.402
4	Forward Madison (3-3-1)	1.271
5	Richmond Kickers (3-2-3)	0.531
6	North Texas SC (3-1-3)	0.381
7	Fort Lauderdale CF (4-1-5)	-0.249
8	FC Tucson (2-2-3)	-0.500
9	Toronto FC II (1-3-3)	-0.546
10	South Georgia Tormenta (4-0-6)	-0.700
11	New England Revolution II (2-1-4)	-0.776
12	North Carolina FC (0-1-4)	-1.873

Now, let’s take a look at how much movement there was between last week and this week to see if my analysis made any sense:

Current Rank	Team	Previous Rank	Result	Change
1	Omaha	1	W 4-2 v. NE	🔼 0.216
2	Chattanooga	4	W 3-2 @ TUC	🔼 0.398
3	Greenville	2	L 3-0 @ NTX	🔽 0.517
4	Madison	3	D 0-0 v. RIC	🔼 0.146
5	Richmond	5	D 0-0 @ MAD	🔽 0.095
6	North Texas	8	W 3-0 v. GVL	🔼 0.512
7	Fort Lauderdale	9	No game	🔼 0.170
8	FC Tucson	7	L 3-2 v. CRW	🔽 0.389
9	Toronto	6	L 1-0 v. TRM L 1-0 @ TRM	🔽 0.852
10	Tormenta	11	W 1-0 @ TFC W 1-0 v. TFC	🔼 0.717
11	New England	10	L 4-2 @ OMA	🔼 0.057
12	North Carolina	12	No game	🔽 0.207

So, most of what I was looking for somewhat came to fruition. Union Omaha didn’t see a whole lot of improvement, even from a two goal win in an incredibly entertaining, satisfying match. Richmond dropping slightly was kinda foreseen, as was the fact that North Texas stood to gain a whole lot with a good result, and that we’d see some movement from both TFC II and Tormenta with teams getting three points versus draws. But if you bothered to scroll all the way down, you’d notice that New England’s rating improved, albeit ever so slightly, even after a multi-goal defeat.

So how did something like this come about? Well, remember that this system is designed to constantly re-evaluate previous matches as the season progresses. Clearly, we’re still learning more about every team in the league (the pair of matches between Tormenta and TFC II, with some MLS guys getting reps for Toronto, stands out more than anything). But New England has now played Richmond, Omaha, and Fort Lauderdale twice, along with Chattanooga. Those teams combined to go 2-1-0 this past weekend, 3-2-0 if you double up Omaha and Richmond (since NE2 played each of them twice). This improvement likely lessened the blow for New England, after a result that was already going to be somewhat softened because their 2 goal loss was to one of the best teams in the league on the road.

So I hope that my look ahead table last week was beneficial, both to prepare for the slate ahead as well as evaluating this method in retrospect to determine it’s effectiveness. So, let’s keep with this cadence for now. Here is what we should look forward to this week:

Date	Home	Away	Quick Synopsis
06.16	Greenville Triumph (1.402)	North Carolina FC (-1.873)	This match is very similar to the Union Omaha match last weekend for Greenville, except Greenville are still another match away from dropping their outliers. They need to dominate this one, or else their climb back up will remain an uphill one.
06.16 & 06.19	Fort Lauderdale CF	Toronto FC II	Similar to TFC II’s pairing last week with Tormenta, this pair of matches will probably only move the needle if one side dominates the other by getting at least four points. Since Toronto have played fewer matches, they are more apt to see drastic movement. This series could telegraph how the rest of their season will go.
06.19	Richmond Kickers	Union Omaha	This is a very milquetoast matchup if you pause to think of everything going on here; a superior team on the road with a team that appears to be slightly above average. Since we’re still early in the season, my guess is that Omaha has more to lose and Richmond has more to gain.
06.19	Forward Madison	New England Revolution II	Madison needs this more as a bounce back. New England continue playing an incredibly difficult schedule, which is why a draw here will probably be a benefit to them.
06.19	South Georgia Tormenta	Greenville Triumph	Tough to gauge this one. Tormenta are on a bit of a hot streak, and Greenville will have a midweek game before this one. Tormenta stands to gain from this one with a result, and I imagine they’d solidify themselves in the middle of my ratings table if they get three points here.
06.19	North Texas SC	FC Tucson	Both of these teams are in the same boat, middling teams in a match where the slightly better team is hosting. This tells me that FC Tucson stands to gain more, unless North Texas can win by multiple goals.
06.20	Chattanooga Red Wolves	North Carolina FC	It probably doesn’t matter how NCFC does against Greenville midweek; if Chattanooga don’t get three points here, they will drop. NCFC are very much in their own tier, enough that even a draw should be a shock here (and a detriment to Chattanooga’s rating).

Enjoy this week’s slate of games. I hope that this enhances your viewing experience, and questions are always welcome in the comment’s section, on Twitter, and on any other social media platform. But if you have my phone number, please don’t call me. I may be old, but I’m not in my 40s just yet.

            Alright Union Omaha fans, you can finally start your migration back to Werner Park.  The Owls return from their six-game road streak to play their second home match of the season.  This Saturday, June 12^th, Union Omaha takes on New England Revolution II at Werner Park.  Kickoff is scheduled for 7 PM (CST) and will air on ESPN+.

            New England comes to Omaha for the first time since last season’s 2-0 win.  You can probably assume that last year’s match is a hush-hush subject among the team.  After all, Nick Firmino was on the receiving end of a crushing tackle from Ethan Vanacore-Decker, which earned Vanacore-Decker a straight red card [Editor’s note: Ethan’s red card was over turned since he missed and Firmino took an egregious dive. Yeah, we shouldn’t talk about this much.]  Minutes later, Firmino scored the insurance goal for the Young Revs.  The loss was only one of two Union Omaha home losses for the 2020 season.

The New England club currently has a game in hand, but sits seven points behind Omaha in the standings and three points outside of the playoffs.  Their only victories this season were against Fort Lauderdale.  Don’t get overly confident, though.  With the exception of one match, every other was settled by a goal difference no greater than one goal for either side.

The clubs have already faced off in 2021, with Union Omaha three points in a 1-0 win in Foxborough Stadium.  The goal came in the 84^th minute when goalkeeper Rashid Nuhu started a fast break and punted into the Revs half, finding forward Greg Hurst in a 1v1.  Hurst was able to lose his defender quickly, made his way toward the middle of the field, and ultimately the top of the 18-yard box.  His shot found the netting on the far side, giving Hurst his second goal of the season.  Nuhu joined rare company, being one of only two goalies to earn an assist in the league.

            If you’re wondering what to expect, you can definitely anticipate a roaring Union Omaha crowd.  Fans haven’t been to Werner Park since April 24^th, when the Owls defeated South Georgia Tormenta 2-0 to start the 2021 season.  In those seven weeks, fans have had to resort to watching matches on television, or traveling halfway across the country.  During Union Omaha’s lone home match this season, Werner Park hosted the largest crowd for a Union Omaha home match, with 2,786 people making their way through the gates.  This Saturday should be able to break that record, both in numbers and atmosphere.

            With regards to action on the field, Union Omaha has to duplicate what they did in the first match against New England: generate lots of offense and keep the defense honest.  The Owls had 20 shots against New England, 13 of those shots were from inside the penalty area.  Forget that the Young Revs had just over 53% of possession because Omaha created way more offense with less possession.  If you’re looking for a statistic, consider this: New England is winless when the opposition scores first and Union Omaha is undefeated when they score first.  Omaha cannot give New England a warm welcome to Werner Park.  They need to press high, challenge fiercely, and score early.

            Union Omaha should also look to take advantage of New England if they get complacent on offense.  Rashid Nuhu displayed excellent situational awareness by catching the Revs too comfortable in Omaha’s half of the field.  If anyone on the team sees the same tactic against New England, look for the long ball, the diagonal run past the backline, and any open space that’s available.  Omaha loves to play with speed and has the roster to punish any opposition, especially those vulnerable to a fast break.

            Did you know soccer was illegal in Mississippi until 1991?  Yep.  Americans were okay with bowl cuts, windbreakers, and awarding an Oscar for Best Picture to “Dances with Wolves,” but “communist kickball”?  Straight to jail.  Don’t worry, soccer is legal in Nebraska, so make sure to head out to Werner Park this Saturday to welcome Union Omaha back and cheer them on to victory.  It’s also legal to discuss soccer on the internet, so keep an eye out for updates in content here at Who Gives A Hoot Media.  Whether it’s a new episode of our podcast or new articles, we’ve got your Union Omaha entertainment covered.

In our first game against Madison, it seemed like we wanted them to have the majority of possession, but we looked terrible in making that happen. 12 days later, it sure seemed like we did a MUCH better job of executing that plan. I didn’t anticipate us having 30.1% of the possession, but I loved to see it. Hopefully, like me, you are much more emotionally stable after match 7 than you were after match 5. That said, let’s dive in.

1) Emir Alihodžić aka Trialist #1

Emir came as close to having the first brace in club history as anyone has so far, forcing and own goal and scoring the game winner. For a guy who has 3 professional goals to his name going into this match he was an extremely unlikely pick to score a pseudo-brace or even start as a forward. But did he play forward?

We all know Jay’s undying devotion to the 4-4-2, it goes without saying. But for Emir, a guy who some of us thought might start at centerback, to start at forward was wild. Obviously, it paid off, but let’s see where Emir really played.

Hmmmm, so you can clearly see Emir (#2) having an average position smack dab in the middle of the center circle. (Conor Doyle is buried under #20 and #6 for Madison). That seems like an odd place for a forward in a 4-4-2. So let’s compare to our best win of season so far. (If you don’t know what game that was, stop everything, read JR’s column and come back, I’ll wait.)

Two things stand out to me here. 1) Greg Hurst has about the exact same position in both games and Evan, who Emir was filling in for, was slightly in front of him in Lauderdale. 2) Emir (buried under #15 and #8 for Lauderdale) is in about the same spot as he was in Madison, a little bit to the left and a little bit back, but still smack dab inside of the center circle.

Not where our forwards usually play, but who I am to question what worked out for us.

2) Boyce moving into first

Devin Boyce, who is the club’s all time leader in appearances (yeah, I know insane), is now tied for first (with EVD) in club history with three game winning assists. What else can I say, but BOOOM.

We asked @devinbernard_ if our return to @WernerPark this Saturday night would be "boom"-worthy. 💥

Devin: pic.twitter.com/C4rRxt2ohJ

— Union Omaha 🦉 (@Union_Omaha) June 9, 2021

3) Is Madison good?

Ahhh the age old question, are the Flamingos any good. We lost to them, we beat them, I want them to be terrible on the field, I just can’t tell. So let’s look at three different metrics: SportsClubStats, American Soccer Analysis, and WGaH Media’s own Jon Ryan’s ratings.

SportsClubStats

SportsClubStats features RPI rankings which have Union Omaha as first and Forward Madison third.

American Soccer Analysis

I took the xGoals Team analysis and standardized some of the offered metrics to a per game basis. For definitions GD is goal difference, xGD is expected goal difference, xPts is expected points, and Diff is points per game minus expected points per game.

Team	Season	Games	GD-xGD	Pts	xPts	Pts/Game	xPts/Game	Diff
GVL	2021	5	2.3	13	9.68	2.60	1.94	0.66
CHA	2021	5	1.91	10	7.51	2.00	1.50	0.50
OMA	2021	7	2.66	14	10.54	2.00	1.51	0.49
TUC	2021	6	-4.13	8	7.05	1.33	1.18	0.16
MAD	2021	6	1.01	11	10.54	1.83	1.76	0.08
NER	2021	6	-2.24	7	6.63	1.17	1.11	0.06
FTL	2021	10	1.01	13	12.44	1.30	1.24	0.06
RIC	2021	7	3.3	10	10.13	1.43	1.45	-0.02
TOR	2021	6	1.32	6	6.33	1.00	1.06	-0.05
TRM	2021	9	-0.47	9	10.13	1.00	1.13	-0.13
NTX	2021	6	-4.81	7	9.48	1.17	1.58	-0.41
NC	2021	5	-1.86	1	6.22	0.20	1.24	-1.04

I believe Diff is telling us how much per game is being added by factors like luck, good shooting and great shot stopping. Madison’s Diff is 0.08 which means their points on the table is basically what their expected points say it should be.

Jon Ryan’s USL League One Ratings

JR has Madison ranked in third in his rankings as well.

All of this would indicate that if Union Omaha is the best team in the league, Forward Madison is close, but not quite as good as we are. To confirm this, I combine JR’s rankings and SportsClubStats RPI and averaged them out to get a weight for opponents faced by each team. Throwing out the games head-to-head, Forward’s draws were, on average, against the 8th best team in the league and our draws were against, on average, the 5th best team. Union Omaha’s wins were, on average, against the 8.83 best team in the league while Madison’s were, on average, against the 10th best team in the league. See my chart below:

Team	RPI	JR	Average
OMA	1	1	1
GVL	2	2	2
MAD	3	3	3
CHA	4	4	4
RIC	5	5	5
TUC	7	7	7
TOR	10	6	8
TRM	6	11	8.5
NER	8	10	9
FTL	9	9	9
NTX	12	8	10
NC	11	12	11.5
Forward Avg Draw	8
Forward Avg Win	10
Omaha Avg Draw	5
Omaha Avg Win	8.83

Not sure my chart actually makes sense to you, but to me it confirms the sad news that our spindly legged neighbors to the north might just be the 3rd best team in the league right now.

So kind of neat that we looked much better than they did last Sunday.

And if you need further reminder of the superiority of Owls over Flamingos, I encourage you watch this highly scientific video.

Start at 16:34 if you need to get straight to that sweet, sweet owl content.

I’ll be honest, this game was 9 days ago but it feels like A LOT longer ago than that. This was match 6 of our season, but the result we got from match 7 made our draw in the desert feel a lot better. We have a few things to unpack from this match so let’s dive in.

1) DAMIA VIADER

I’ve been posting Dami’s stats on Twitter when I write this column because it seems like it is lazy to use space in this column to talk over and over again about Dami’s brilliance and importance to our team. BUT, when a player pops off a 8.9 rating on FotMob and makes team of the week, I’ll make an exception.

Let’s quickly remember this preposterous goal line clearance in the 38′

Dami leads the league in crosses by a preposterous margin. If you added the crosses attempted by the 3rd (32) and 4th (30) ranked players, you would still have less crosses than Dami has (63). The player 2nd on the list plays for Fort Lauderdale who has played 3 more games than Union Omaha. Dami is 2nd in the league in chances created with 22. He is one chance behind a player who also plays for Fort Lauderdale. (All stats current through 6/10).

Okay, now that you understand just how preposterous the stats Dami is putting up are, let’s look at the Toronto game. Dami had 13 of Union Omaha’s 29 crosses and 4 of the 11 chances the team created.

7 of those 29 crosses were successful for the team, and Dami had FIVE of those crosses.

Also this was the first game that Dami had an assist but did not score a goal. I think more assists are on their way.

2) First corner kick goal?

If you were at Rathskeller late night last Wednesday you might have heard a few massive UO fans talking about how Union Omaha hadn’t scored off a corner. Those fans (*cough* me *cough*) are wrong. Last year, JP scored directly off of a corner at North Texas, Elma scored at Tormenta following a corner, and Evan scored at Fort Lauderdale following a corner. Daltyn’s goal fits into that second category, a goal following a corner.

What was a first for the club was a central defender scoring a goal. Congrats Daltyn!

3) Impact Subs

Lots of chatter about the difference the subs made, Boyce won the corner that led to our goal and, as always, Tobi looks like he is on another level. However, our constant drip, drip of chances didn’t seem to change much after the subs came on.

g+ GameFlow: USL League One Regular Season @TorontoFCII v @Union_Omaha on June 02, 2021. #TFCLive #UpTheOwls #TORvOMA pic.twitter.com/cjSlfvFqei

— GameFlow (@GameFlowxPG) June 9, 2021

You can see that we continued to create small chances at about the same rate after the 67′ as we did before. I need to keep learning more so I can have some better xG analysis than that, but hey, 11 points from 6 straight road games is good enough for me.

As of the time that I began typing this post, the 2021 USL League One season is more than 20% complete, with 38 of 168 regular season games in the books. And I don’t mean simply metaphorical books, but Excel workbooks as well. That’s right, it’s time for amateur statisticians (me) to pretend they know what they’re talking about as they publish team ratings. I’ve been sharing the ratings internally amongst the WGaH media empire early in the season, and some members believed early on that these ratings had a little spice, so I’m curious to see if they believe they’ve mellowed out some.

If you didn’t read my introductory article to how I’m calculating ratings this season or need a refresher, feel free to go back to this article to learn more. I will talk briefly about how we got to these ratings, but without further ado let’s take a look (ratings as of matches played through 06.06.2021):

Rank	Team (W-D-L)	Rating
1	Union Omaha (4-2-1)	2.251
2	Greenville Triumph (4-1-0)	1.919
3	Forward Madison (3-2-1)	1.125
4	Chattanooga Red Wolves (3-1-1)	1.030
5	Richmond Kickers (3-1-3)	0.626
6	Toronto FC II (1-3-1)	0.306
7	FC Tucson (2-2-2)	-0.111
8	North Texas SC (2-1-3)	-0.131
9	Fort Lauderdale CF (4-1-5)	-0.419
10	New England Revolution II (2-1-3)	-0.833
11	South Georgia Tormenta (2-0-6)	-1.417
12	North Carolina FC (0-1-4)	-1.666

So here are a couple of broad takeaways at first glance:

• Union Omaha being ahead of Greenville Triumph by a moderately healthy margin, even with a loss
• There is a rather wide disparity between teams that are either .500 or just one game below .500

The first one is fairly simple to explain away: Union Omaha just finished a very successful road trip. Points on the road matter. For example, Union Omaha’s 2-0 win at Fort Lauderdale was worth twice as much as North Texas’ 4-2 home win versus them two weekends before. So not only are we accumulating points on the road, but we also don’t have as many ho-hum results at home to water down those results. In fact, here are the three most impressive results so far this season:

Date	Match	Rating
04.17.2021	New England 0-3 Richmond	5.177 (Richmond)
05.07.2021	Fort Lauderdale 0-2 Omaha	4.209 (Omaha)
06.06.2021	Madison 1-2 Omaha	4.133 (Omaha)

But even with more positive results, Union Omaha could still cede the top spot to Greenville (now that they’re actually playing again). We have some home games coming up, and those games will balance out the strength of schedule we’ve played so far. Union Omaha’s current strength of schedule played is 0.522, which is quite impressive given we are responsible for a portion of that record of 1-2-4 (1). For example, you have to go all the way down to New England in 10th place in the ratings to find a team that has played a more difficult schedule so far this season.

As for the disparity between similar teams in the middle, it usually can boil down to just one game. See above with Richmond Kickers, who currently have the highest rated game so far this season. However, without a great performance this upcoming weekend against Madison their rating will suffer. Not just because of the potential for a loss, but also because Richmond is playing their eighth match. Remember, once a team has played eight matches their best and worst results are removed from their calculation, as those matches are being considered outliers. So, removing their best and worst game will likely hurt Richmond’s rating, probably more so than it would most other teams. Let’s compare them to Union Omaha for example, who are also about to play their eighth game this weekend:

Team	Date	Best/Worst	Result	Value
Richmond	04.17.2021	Best	New England 0-3 Richmond	5.177
Richmond	05.02.2021	Worst	Fort Lauderdale 2-1 Richmond	-1.953
Omaha	05.07.2021	Best	Fort Lauderdale 0-2 Omaha	4.209
Omaha	05.26.2021	Worst	Madison 2-1 Omaha	-1.189

So Richmond may only be dropping a slightly higher net value than Omaha, but they do so with a lot less buffer to play with. I’ll try to not simply throw the rest of the individual match values at you, but here are both team’s 2nd best and 2nd worst results at the moment, both of which are likely to remain part of how their overall rating is calculated next week:

Team	Date	Best/Worst	Result	Value
Richmond	06.05.2021	2nd best	Richmond 3-2 New England	1.480
Richmond	05.29.2021	2nd worst	Chattanooga 2-1 Richmond	-1.190
Omaha	06.06.2021	2nd best	Madison 1-2 Omaha	4.133
Omaha	06.02.2021	2nd worst	Toronto 1-1 Omaha	1.721

The difference in each team’s net value from the above matches is quite stark. That’s why losing this upcoming weekend, even though it’s on the road against a strong opponent like Madison, could cause Richmond to shift considerably in the order that teams are rated.

I will post updates to these ratings each week through the rest of the season. I’m not sure how much any of us will get out of looking ahead to the weekend slate with ratings in mind and, frankly, I’m just happy to be here talking about numbers with other number nerds, but let’s do it (Note: in the event this is published on 06.10.2021 or later, I will not consider the TFC II v. Tormenta match on 06.09.2021):

Date	Home	Away	Quick Synopsis
06.12.2021	Union Omaha (2.251)	New England Revolution II (-0.833)	This is Union Omaha’s eighth game, so their outlier matches will be removed after this match. Anything less than a two goal victory at home will marginally help their rating at best, or possibly even lower it.
06.12.2021	Forward Madison (1.125)	Richmond Kickers (0.626)	As mentioned before, Richmond are probably more affected by this match than Madison.
06.12.2021	FC Tucson (-0.111)	Chattanooga Red Wolves (1.030)	The fact this match is simply being played helps both, they currently have the lowest and third lowest strength of schedule in the league.
06.13.2021	North Texas SC (-0.131)	Greenville Triumph (1.919)	This is the kind of match that has one-sided potential. North Texas probably doesn’t suffer much with a loss, but both teams can gain considerably with a win since the match is in Arlington.
06.13.2021	South Georgia Tormenta (-1.417)	Toronto FC II (0.306)	The same can probably be said of both matches they’ll play this week, but results instead of draws will shape Toronto’s rating considerably given they’ve only played five matches.

Thanks for reading, everyone. I look forward to sharing these updates with you from now until the cup is lifted!

Footnotes:

(1) So if you calculate our strength of schedule the way I’m calculating it (which is counting each match individually, therefore Madison counts twice, for example), you get a winning percentage of 0.522. But since we’ve played those teams that means, naturally, our results against them are included. And since our record is 4-2-1, that means those teams combined records, when you don’t include our results, would actually be even better.

Raw data for Tormenta, Fort Lauderdale, Revs 2, Greenville, Toronto, and Madison (twice):
Their overall combined records: 19-10-17 (.522)
Their combined records when you remove our results: 17-8-12 (.568)

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