Phoenix Rising claws back to earn road point in Tulsa

After conceding off a mistake from goalkeeper Chituru Odunze, Phoenix Rising battled back to earn a 1-1 draw with FC Tulsa.

Less than five months removed from Rising’s playoff elimination at the hands of Tulsa, Phoenix struggled to create chances en route to the side’s third consecutive league draw.

Unproductive first half

In similar fashion to countless Phoenix Rising matches over the last year, the team struggled to generate chances in the opening half against FC Tulsa. In the first half, Rising only took five shots, two of which ended on target, for a measly 0.84 expected goals.

A large reason to the lack of production came from Rising opting to play much more directly, forcing its backline and goalkeeper Chituru Odunze to launch long much more than usual.

While it did produce a couple of half-chances for Rising, the lack of quality balls mixed with the disjointed front three led to Rising struggling to generate consistent chances.

Another detrimental facet was Hope Avayevu missing the match to an injury, the first match he’s missed since joining Rising. It prompted Pa-Modou Kah to deploy a midfield trio of JP Scearce, Diego Gomez and Jean-Eric Moursou. Though it offered Rising with much more stability, it limited Rising’s creativity going forward.

On the opposite side of the pitch, Rising’s defense stifled FC Tulsa’s attack with a reworked backline. Left back Luke Biasi was moved to the bench, as Aleksander Vuković received his first start of the season. As Scearce returned to the midfield, Rafael Czichos also returned to the starting lineup having missed Rising’s previous three games to injury.

Change the tides in second half

Yet again, Phoenix Rising are a second half team last 20 minutes team. After lacking an dynamic attack in the first half, the same can be said for the first 15 minutes of the second half.

Then, at the 62nd minute mark, Pa-Modou Kah brought on Ihsan Sacko and Juan Carvajal for Diego Gomez and Gunnar Studenhoft, respectively. Sacko brought energy to Rising’s attack, creating a flurry of chances for Rising.

It took until the 73rd minute for Rising to attempt its first shot, but Sacko’s flurry of chances soon turned to an avalanche of shots.

Carvajal had consecutive header efforts, missing the first one, before finding the back of the net moments later. Rising kept its foot on the gas after the equalizer, but as the clocked ticked down, appeared to revert back to a more directionless attack.

They were much better reaching the final third down the stretch, but only mustered one shot in the final ten minutes of the match.

Still in search of first league win for Phoenix RIsing

Four matches played, no wins, one loss and three draws.

Phoenix Rising now has to turn its attention from this trip to Tulsa to a difficult upcoming stretch. On Wednesday, Rising travels to Irvine for a round two clash against Orange County in the U.S. Open Cup, before travelling north on Saturday for a match against Sacramento Republic.

This upcoming week will unquestionably burn through Rising’s already depleted depth, before Phoenix has a rivalry match against New Mexico United.

Finding a win in the next two league games certainly isn’t make or break for Rising’s season, but they can’t wait forever to find their first victory.

The further Rising slips behind fellow conference foes in points, the home stretch of the season becomes infinitely more important.

Rees’ Take

Have you ever seen the 1993 rom-com Groundhog Day?

The movie contains Bill Murray’s character, Phil Connors, getting stuck in an endless loop of the same day — his least favorite holiday, Groundhog Day. Connors struggles with living the same day over and over again, driven to the point of insanity.

That’s almost exactly what it feels like watching this Phoenix Rising team. However, as Connors eventually found joy in the repetitive nature, that feels like an impossible task in Phoenix.

Match after match, Rising comes out of the gates slow. Through the opening four games of the regular season, Rising has only scored one goal in the first half. Even that goal made it barely, as Ihsan Sacko drove home a wonderful effort in the 40th minute against Orange County.

The attacking struggles, though, aren’t the only thing that costs Rising. They’re continuing to concede self-inflicted goals, as Rising are making defensive mistakes by not tracking runners or playing risky passes that aren’t worth the reward.

These aren’t just themes from this season. Watch any game from the home stretch of last year, and you’ll see the exact same story play out time and time again.

I don’t quite know how to diagnose a change for Rising, as it has seemingly become engrained in this club’s identity. There’s the never-ending list of injuries for this team, too, that has made it difficult to say who the strongest eleven is and what that would even look like.

Rising could revert back to its defensive-first mentality from the final few games of last season, but that would be at the cost of creating a somehow even more anemic attack. They could try and go back to the pure-chaos style that opened last season, where Rising broke scoreboards across the country with the amount of goals they scored, but also the goals they conceded.

The only thing that I’m hoping for is that I can turn Groundhog Day off and finally watch something better.

Top image: FC Tulsa via Phoenix Rising FC