Phoenix Rising drops away match to Tampa Bay Rowdies

Phoenix Rising‘s league unbeaten run came to an end at the hands of the Tampa Bay Rowdies in Florida.

Phoenix fell behind early in the match, and trailed by three goals at half-time to the only remaining unbeaten side in USL Championship, while failing to score in the league for only the second time this season.

Trailing early

Less than 75 seconds into the match at Al Lang Stadium, and having touched the ball a total of four times, Phoenix Rising was behind.

Unable to deal with an attacking throw in early in the match, Rising’s defence ultimately left Pedro Dolabella with a little too much space on the edge of the goal area, and when picked out by MD Myers, the Brazilian made no mistake in putting it away.

Pelayo joins the Phoenix Rising injury list

Phoenix Rising has seriously struggled with injuries throughout the season, and entered the night with five players listed as out through either illness or injury. Charlie Dennis also missed the match through suspension after being sent off in the draw against San Antonio FC.

In Florida, Rising may have added to that list. Adrian Pelayo, who has yet to miss out on a matchday squad in 2026, went down early in the game and had to be substituted for.

In Pelayo’s absence, midfielder JP Scearce dropped into the defensive line, with Jamison Ping entering the match in the middle of the park.

Not enough

Before the break, Phoenix Rising was down by not one, nor two, but three goals.

MD Myers doubled the host’s advantage with a well-taken strike in the 28th minute, before Louis Perez’s effort made it three goals for Tampa Bay in just over half an hour.

On the other end, Rising struggled to threaten. Of the three shots on target that Phoenix had all match, two came from outside of the penalty area. The third was a weakly-chested effort from Ihsan Sacko that was easily gathered by Austin Pack and, in all honesty, stretched the definition of a “shot.”

Owain’s take

Is it finally over? Oh, thank goodness.

There are some games you want to forget as soon as they are over. Then, there are some games you want to forget while they’re still ongoing. This match safely fell into the latter category.

The defense made errors. The midfield didn’t put up enough resistance. The forwards didn’t create enough chances. If you read those three sentences together, you can probably guess why Phoenix Rising had a pretty rough Saturday night.

All of that being said, it’s not as though we should have ever expected things to go that much better than they did.

Tampa Bay is the only unbeaten side remaining in the league, and there’s a reason for that. They’re genuinely a good team, and should be there or thereabouts come the end of the season.

Expecting a win on the road against such a team is asking for too much. Sure, they could have pulled off an upset on another night, but it’s not fair to expect it.

I’m not sure how much there is to learn from this game, even if there will be moments that the coaching staff will pick out and look at on the training field.

In many ways, it was less a learning exercise than simply a reminder of where these two teams are. Phoenix Rising may be on the up in some regards, and it’s still a squad that shouldn’t accept less than a home playoff match come the postseason. It isn’t, however, the dominant team that it was five years ago. Tampa Bay may lay claim to such a title. Phoenix Rising cannot.

Beyond that, I can’t suggest that things are any different to how they were going into Saturday’s match. Sure, Rising’s confidence may have taken a knock, and the momentum alongside it, but this isn’t a match that is going to define Phoenix’s season.

For now, I’ll just enjoy the fact that that game was out of the way pretty quickly this holiday weekend.

Top image: Tampa Bay Rowdies