Dutch Lions Win Third Straight at DOC Stadium beating Pittsburgh U23 2-0
Dayton – The Dayton Dutch Lions FC (2-6-2, 8pts) played the Pittsburgh Riverhounds U23 (2-6-2, 8 pts) at DOC Stadium on Thursday night. It was a hard fought game on both sides, but the Lion’s came out victorious winning their third game at home 2-0.
Dayton and Pittsburgh started the first half battle in the middle third of the pitch. Few chances were given on each end and neither team was able to capitalize.
The twenty sixth minute saw Dayton’s Eric Kissinger take it down the right side and pass in to Michael Frasca. He shot but the strike was not hard enough. Shortly after, Nick Dowdell ran down and cut in and fired to the near post, but the ball went just wide.
The game started to go the Lions way in the twenty eighth minute. A through ball looking for Lorenzo Rodrigues was stopped by a Pittsburgh defender, but Rodrigues applied quick pressure, won the ball and put it in the back of the net.
Dayton’s Kissinger found Michael Frasca in the thirtieth minute when he switched fields. The ball spun off a Pittsburgh defender to the feet of Frasca who sailed the ball over the goal.
Pittsburgh’s Corbin Duncan fired a shot from about thirty yards out and Dayton’s Stefan Cleveland leapt to the top left corner for the save.
The first half ended with the Dayton Dutch Lions leading the Pittsburgh Riverhounds U23 1-0.
The second half began and Pittsburgh took it up a notch, pressing Dayton. In the forty seventh minute Angelo Jack had an opportunity on the left side but sent the ball high. The next twenty minutes saw Pittsburgh on the attack.
Fresh legs gave the Riverhounds another boost in the sixty third minute. The Lions found themselves on the defense again. As Pittsburgh continued looking for the tying goal, keeper Cleveland was forced to come out and kick it away.
The seventy first minute Tyrone Leandro stole the ball in the opponents end and turned and shot, fired wide, but earned a corner for the Lions.
A cross in the seventy ninth minute found the head of Dayton’s Leandro who struck it down hard toward the goal, but the ball bounced wide.
A little luck and good defense kept the Lions up by one in the eighty fourth minute. A mistake left Dayton exposed, but the defense closed ranks and blocked the attack that followed.
The last few minutes of second half play went end to end. Dayton fought to keep its one goal lead, while Pittsburgh worked hard to equalize. The Midwest rivals battled well into the four minutes of stoppage time.
The Lion’s Frasca ran across the Riverhound’s goal toward the end of stoppage. An aggressive move by a Pittsburgh defender left him on the ground in the box. A penalty kick was awarded. Alex Ranalli stepped up for the Lions and put it under the right arm of Pittsburgh keeper, Daniel Lynd to seal the win.
Dayton’s Coach Bal shared these comments after the game: “I really liked the first twenty to twenty five miutes of our game. We really decided what happened. We moved the ball around nicely. The other team sat back a little bit so it gave us the time to play. We played well, we scored a goal. After that the other team started to put more pressure on us. Then we fell back to the problem we had before, where we sat back too far instead of continuing to play. We played the long ball too early and then we would lose it and be back on our heels. In the second half we sat back way too far. We couldn’t play out of the pressure until the last five or ten minutes when we started to play again. We had a good start, a rough middle and a great end.”
The Dayton Dutch Lions FC (3-6-2) The Dayton Men play the second game of a double header, with the Women playing at 5pm, on Saturday, July 11th at 7:30pm when they take on the Michigan Bucks (9-1-1). They travel to play the Derby City Rovers (1-7-2) on Monday, July 13th at 7:30pm at Centre College