Dual Shutouts Leave Points Versus OCSC

By Brian Jennings

Head Coach Pablo Mastroeni said in the postgame presser that Colorado needs to put more shots on target. Saturday night, there were plenty of attempts, each getting closer than the last until Shkelzen Gashi hit the post in the second half. However, out of 13 shots only 1 was on goal the entire match. That allowed Orlando City Soccer Club to escape the altitude at 0-0 and a point which they gladly accepted.

The match saw newest signing Sebastian LeToux make his first Rapids start out wide and the Frenchman played his part fairly well on the night. Getting involved, looking to distribute forward to the likes of Kevin Doyle (who was again the hardest working man in burgundy) and Shkelzen Gashi towards goal, LeToux was pleased with the direction Colorado took possession but said they were maybe just a bit too anxious when that happened.

“I think we had most of the possession with Orlando staying a bit back. I think sometimes we played too quick and lost the ball too fast,” he told the Voice of C38. “It’s part of the game so we tried to be better in the second half. It was just a bit hard in the first half to keep the ball when we wanted to.”
“We huffed and puffed-we were fine but we weren’t brilliant. They weren’t either. It was just a cancelled-each-other-out first half,” said Doyle, who was struggling to define the first half with neither side really staking claim to play.

The second half saw a 15-20 minute stretch when Colorado did everything right except for putting the ball into the back of the net. “The pressing we were doing-more quick and to the ball when we were losing it. We knew that as the game would go we would attack them on the side and have some good crosses. We did, unfortunately we didn’t have the last touch to score,” said LeToux.

Near misses by Doyle, Gashi, and the aforementioned strike of the woodwork could only frustrate the fans expecting the go-ahead goal to arrive. “We were better the second half. We worked our nuts off all over the pitch,” exclaimed Doyle. “Their forward line was exceptional but they didn’t really cause us any trouble. We had plenty of ifs and buts and maybes but that’s just the way it is-It feels like a loss but it wasn’t.”