Oakland Roots vs. Phoenix Rising - Match Preview (August 4, 2021)

 Oakland Roots host Phoenix Rising for their Home “Opener” on August 4, 2021 at 7:00 at Laney College, Oakland.  The match will be broadcast on ESPN2, which is pretty cool.  More importantly:

Dollar Beers!  Tickets are still available!

And here’s the thing about the dollar beers: you’re going to need them.

The Team

Phoenix Rising were founded in 2014 as Arizona United Soccer Club, and have played their entire existence in USL.  Rising have taken a steady path upwards, winning the USL in 2019, behind top scorer Solomon Asante.  Rising took second in the shortened 2020 season.  From 2017 to the onset of COVID, Rising averaged more than 6,000 fans per game.  Rising play at Phoenix Rising Soccer Complex at Wild Horse Pass, on the Gila River Indian Community adjacent to Phoenix.

  

Didier Drogba played for Rising to end his career in the 2017 and 2018 seasons.  Phoenix is not the West London of America, but I suspect that if you made “The Good Place” with all English characters, the Eleanor character might be from West London.  

Here’s the thing about Rising, friends:

Does it get worse?

It’s not great. Rising have more points and more goals in their last three games than the Roots have… at all. Rising are leading the pack in the Pacific Division on 32 points, and in fact, have the highest points per game of any team in the entire USL.  

Last Match-Up

These teams met in Chandler on May 8, which was Phoenix’s second game and Oakland’s first.  Rising got off to a quick start, scoring in the 10th.  A Lindo Mfeka horizontal pass just outside the 18-yard box went awry and bounced to Dadashov, who sent a blistering shot on goal.  Zeus made a wonderful save, but could only parry the ball out, and Asante pounced onto the ball.  Santi Moar made it 2-0 in the 48th out of nowhere--a long pass from the Rising leftback found Moar running in behind the Roots’ defense.  Moar closed on Zeus and five-holed him tidily.  Soloman Asante got his brace in the 68th, taking advantage of a mental lapse by Zeus, who passed the ball squarely to Asante in the 18-yard-box who then scored essentially unchallenged.

It was a rough game, and Oakland paid for their errors.  We had hoped at the time that it was early-season rust, and that may still be the case.  Unfortunately, the fits and starts for Oakland’s season have meant the rust has never fully come off.  

Players to Watch

The Rising attack runs through one-two punch of Asante and Moar.  We are going to highlight the attack for this preview because, uh, I guess let’s hope that we don’t spend all of Wednesday night thinking about them, but just in case...

Solomon Asante # 20 - The Rising captain is having a great season.  He has 7 goals and 6 assists.  That makes him tied for 4th in the league in goals, 2nd in assists.  Asante is a 31-year-old Ghanaian who has played four seasons with the Rising and netted 48 goals in 92 matches in that time.  In 2019, Rising’s championship season, he netted 22 in 32 with 17 assists (although 9 were penalties), resulting in Asante winning the USL’s Golden Boot and the USL MVP.  Prior to Phoenix, Asante played for teams in Ghana, Burkina Faso, and D.R. Congo.  Asanted only has 1 goal in his last 4 matches, but picked up a hat trick of assists in Phoenix’s July 17 drubbing of LA Galaxy II.

Santi Moar # 7 - Moar is 8th in the league in goals per 90 (tied for 4th in raw goals) and 5th in the league in assists per 90.  Moar is a 27-year-old Spaniard in his second season with Rising.  He netted 2 and assisted 5 in the shortened 2020 season.  Moar played college ball in North Carolina, then moved to Charlotte Eagles, Bethlehem Steel, and New Mexico United for the 2019 season, where he put together a respectable 11 goals and 5 assists in 32 matches.  

Rufat Dadashov # 9 - Azeri center forward Dadashov is 6’2”.  Dadashov plays in the center of the attack, a powerful aerial threat in the box, and a focal point and distributor on the attack with his back to goal.  He had a cheeky flick goal off of a long set piece in Phoenix’s last game.  Dadashov’s last club before moving to Phoenix last season was Preussen Muenster, which you’d think would be a bigger club, given the relative prominence of its city.  Well, you might not.  I do.  An interesting thing about a number of German clubs is that they are named things like “Borussia” or “Preussen” despite not being in (the older historical) Prussia. This may be something of a “zeal of the converted” as Westphalia (home to Muenster, Dortmund, and Moenchengladbach) became a Prussian providence in the early 19th century, and Prussian identity was pretty central to the Germanic identity at the time soccer clubs were being founded.  This is a soccer blog.

James Musa # 41 - James Musa is a regular starter in Rising’s defense, and has a number of appearances for the New Zealand youth teams and three for the senior club.  We tracked down a youtube interview he gave, as we had hoped to report that he sounds like Taika Waititi, and we regret to inform you that he does not.

Predictions

Bloom - My predictions have been bullish all season, and it hasn't helped.  I am guessing Rising take it 3-1.  Prove me wrong!  If not...

RootsBlog - The Blog has said before that anyone could beat anyone else in the Pacific Division. Its *possible* that’s not true. I think Roots will be amped to be back in Oakland, and might even jump out to an early lead. But I don’t see them holding off Phoenix for the full 90. I see a 2-1 loss, and a lot of postgame commentary about how this match is something for Roots to build on.