It might have been the start of fall break, but the Eagles didn’t take any time off battling Virginia to a 1-1 tie on Friday, October 6th at Newton Soccer Field. CJ Williams scored for the Eagles with Stephen Annor Gyamfi answering 11 minutes later to tie the game in the 76th minute.
Williams’ first career goal came in the 65th minute to open the scoring for the Eagles. The play started with Augustine Boadi firing a shot from distance. The shot clanged off the crossbar and the Virginia defense rushed to clear it. In the chaos, the clearance header fell to Diego Ochoa, who took a touch to the right under pressure. The Virginia defender got a foot on the ball, but the clearance ricocheted off Xavier O’Neil and fell to Williams, who turned and poked the ball past Virginia goalkeeper Joey Batrouni with his left foot. Batrouni got a hand on the ball, but couldn’t get down enough to keep the ball out of the near post side netting.
The Cavaliers answered 11 minutes later. A failed clearance by the Eagles backline gave Virginia the ball back and the Cavaliers recycled the play to the left side. With no one closing down on Paul Wiese, the Virginia defender had the time and space to pick out the perfect cross to Gyamfi who was waiting in the box. Gyamfi took a few steps before artfully arching his header into the back of the Eagles net past a diving Brennan Klein. The header tied the game 1-1 in the 76th minute.
The Williams goal serves as an excellent summary of both the game and the Eagles’ season so far: the defense does the heavy lifting with the offense having yet to catch fire. During the first 20 minutes of the game it appeared as if the Eagles were playing mini-pitch, with most of their players crammed onto one side of the field in an attempt to maintain defensive shape. Seeing the Eagles’ game plan, the Cavaliers were able to grow into the game forcing BC to exert more energy than the team perhaps wanted to.
Despite having only two shots on frame, the game demonstrated that the Eagles are growing more comfortable in the final third. Despite nagging injuries that have prevented BC from being able to play a consistent starting 11, it’s deep enough into the season where most players have seen a substantial number of minutes in their position allowing chemistry to start to develop. Alfie Hughes, for example, seems more comfortable on the ball and in his partnership with Boadi, allowing the two to play off of each other and carry the ball further down the wing.
As the goals refuse to come from open play, the Eagles have started to mix in long corners occasionally, hoping to take advantage of chaos in the box. Although still in favor of shorter corners and trick plays, the long corners have seen the Eagles have some different looks at the ball. With eight corners on the evening, BC is still experimenting to find a way to turn those set pieces into goals—or at least shots on net.
While not the result the Eagles wanted, the sustained push forward after the Gyamfi goal is perhaps the confidence booster the Eagles need going into the remaining ACC games on their schedule. With link up play improving and a developing arsenal of short and long corner kicks in addition to possession retaining short goal kicks or line breaking longer ones, the Eagles are starting to have options—even if those options have yet to develop into a lethal attack.
Routinely playing several freshmen, confidence and a consistently aggressive mentality are the Eagles best allies as the season winds down. While both O’Neil and Marcos Dos Santos are looking for their first goal, O’Neil has three assists on the season, including one on the Williams goal.
The tightly contested match saw six yellow cards with Marcos Dos Santos, Christian Bejar, and Ochoa all picking one up for the Eagles. BC, already having seen Ted Cargill miss a game due to accumulation, will need to limit the physicality going into the last five games of the season in order to avoid more players missing game time.
The Eagles (3-4-4) took on Yale (5-3-2) for a non-conference Tuesday night matchup at 7:00 pm on October 10th.
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