Bob Lilley was able to cut a much happier figure than he has done after the past few weeks as his Riverhounds played out a 0-0 draw on the road against Charleston Battery on Saturday night.
As my colleague Corey Crisan will attest to after his work covering the game against Indy Eleven last week, sometimes dealing with the Riverhounds head coach can be something of an ordeal, especially if he isn’t too happy with the team’s performances (where Corey was not only kept waiting 25 minutes for Lilley to appear as he was speaking to players on the pitch afterwards, but had to sit through a lengthy press conference as well).
However coming off the back of the draw against Charleston, Lilley seemed to cut a more positive figure when speaking after the game: “We were pretty good in the first half. We had better chances, and we were in the ascendency going into halftime. The second half, we were stretched, and didn’t play as well, but on the whole, we worked hard. We dodged some bullets in the second half, and the defending wasn’t as good. It was a good performance, but obviously not good enough to come away with three points.”
The Hounds’ opponents came into the game with the second-most points of anyone in the USL behind only Louisville City FC, and with the Hounds having lost their past two games and conceded seven goals in their last four, they needed to do something to get back on the right track, and a 0-0 draw might not be the greatest result to come away with, but it can certainly act as the start of a reset point for the team after their recent struggles.
Indeed Lilley saw that there was immediate progress from the side coming off the performances of the last few weeks, although as is always the case, he sees plenty more work that needs to be done:
“I don’t want to overstate it. We were good tonight, but we have to get better. There’s things we can do better. The last two weeks have been pretty good performances. Last week (against Indy), if we finish some chances and defend a corner kick, we get a result. Today, we defended corners better. We still let some balls drop in the box, but we improved in that area. It’s been much better the last two games, compared to the three before that.”
Alas though, the main problem for the Hounds remained their lack of finishing prowess up front. The visitors were able to generate some offense, with ten shots in total, three of which were on target, but they still just don’t have that magical touch that gets the ball where it’s supposed to be, the back of the net:
“Nobody’s had Charleston on their heels as much as we did the first 30 minutes, but we have to make those moments count… The key now, for us, is continuing to get better and making the most of our opportunities.”
On the subject of a lack of goals (this is what we call a ‘tease’ in the business), there is a feature on the way that focuses on one of the men responsible for their struggles, summer signing Kazaiah Sterling and what he needs to be doing more of in order to get himself and the Hounds back on track, so be sure to keep an eye out for that.
