ST. PETERSBURG — The Tampa Bay Rowdies demolished New York Red Bulls II on Saturday and it’s easy to just say this was because of good shooting. While that was certainly part of it aerial duels were the key to laying a platform that could lead to good shooting.
Aerial duels is a statistic with one of the biggest disparities in the match and the one that was the most key to leading to the win for the Rowdies. Controlling 62.1 percent of aerial duels allowed them to control the initial ball when it was released from the two goalkeepers and that allowed them to then set up how things would be played.
This can also be seen when we look at where the match was played. Looking at the above heat map you can see that the match was almost entirely played in the NYRB II half and rarely in the Tampa Bay half, most of the action there coming from back-passes.
Part of the issue for the Red Bulls II was the crossing, the Rowdies defense made 16 clearances as part of another strong defensive performance. That kept the Jersey-based side down to a 7.1 percent crossing accuracy from their 14 crosses, making it almost impossible to create chances from the wings, which was where most of the attack from the visitors came.
Knowing that the crossing wasn’t going to work forced New York into shots from worse areas, which led to an xG of just 0.5. The Red Bulls II’s best chance was an xG of barely over 0.1 while the Rowdies managed chances at 0.3 (all resulting in goals). When your xG is poor it’s a sign that you shouldn’t be taking the shots from where you’re taking them, half of the visitors’ shots came from outside the box which made it hard to score.
It’s easy to overlook how good the Rowdies were defensively in this match but again they were over 50 percent on tackle success rate compared to their opponents who only managed 25 percent.
There were two jaw-dropping data points that the Rowdies lost; possession and interceptions. While it’s not unusual to win a match without winning possession it’s very unusual to win it by six goals while still losing possession. That’s what made winning those aerial duels so crucial, they could control the ball without holding it for the majority of the match.
Tampa Bay gave away an unbelievable 23 interceptions in the match, while it’s something that can be written off, only one of them was in their own half, it’s still something for the team to look at improving going into the next match.
Photo courtesy Tampa Bay Rowdies
Florida Soccer Report 