Takeaways from Inter Miami’s drama-filled 2-1 road loss to D.C. United
As Inter Miami coach Diego Alonso looked back at his team’s drama-filled 2-1 loss to D.C. United Saturday and the 0-2 start to the club’s inaugural season, he got philosophical.
“Soccer can be unjust, just like life, but you have to keep fighting and at the end of the day, you’ll be rewarded,” he said. “These are tests. If you give to soccer, it will give back.”
Inter Miami hopes to be rewarded with a win in its sold-out home opener Saturday at 2:30 p.m. against the Los Angeles Galaxy. In the meantime, here are takeaways from the D.C. loss:
Andres Reyes was impressive in his first start
Reyes, a 20-year-old Colombian defender on loan from Atletico Nacional, won several one-on-one duels in the open field against D.C. United, completed 78 percent of his passes, made three tackles and even had a shot on goal. Alonso is still getting to know his players and tinkering with his lineups, but look for speedy Reyes to remain a starter.
Although he joined the team as an unknown, the young defender is a member of the Colombian Under-23 national team, and has played important matches in the Under-20 World Cup and Olympic qualifying.
Robinson injury impact unknown
Robbie Robinson had a promising start, dribbling up the field and finding Lewis Morgan on the wing, which led to Rodolfo Pizarro’s historic first goal.
The No. 1 draft pick out of Clemson has been the go-to forward since Juan Agudelo injured a hamstring in preseason. He has adapted to the pro game fairly quickly. He can hold the ball, stretch the defense, and showed in the first half against D.C. that he was more willing to shoot than he was in the opening game at Los Angeles FC.
But he went down with an apparent knee injury just before halftime, and did not play the second half. Team officials are hopeful it is not a serious injury.
Inter Miami cannot afford to lose another forward. They are playing without Julian Carranza, the 19-year-old Argentine who was having a standout preseason before injuring his foot. He is expected to be out until at least late April. Agudelo is the team’s only true center forward.
Inter Miami sporting director Paul McDonough and owner Jorge Mas said before the season-opener that they are shopping for a striker to fill their remaining Designated Player spot. They said the deal will likely come during the summer transfer window. In the meantime, they have to hope Robinson is ok, or find a stop-gap solution in a hurry.
Alonso is proactive
He has coached only two matches with Inter Miami, but Alonso’s tactical style is clear – he likes to attack. He made two changes in the starting lineup from the first week – defender Alvas Powell and midfielder Matias Pellegrini were replaced by Andres Reyes and Dylan Nealis.
The new lineup, with Ben Sweat and Nealis out wide and Nico Figal ready to join the attack, created more scoring chances than the team had last week. Even when Miami was down a man, it continued to attack aggressively.
“When we had 11 players, I think we executed to perfection,” Alonso said. “We were better. We attacked the spaces really well and we dominated. And when we finished with 10 men, we played with a four-man back line, but we kept playing with two forwards and three midfielders, which still allowed us to get to the opponent’s penalty area.”
Roman Torres to miss next game
The most impactful play of the game was the hand ball by veteran defender Torres, which led to a bizarre chain of events for Inter Miami. Torres sent an errant pass into the path of D.C. United’s Julian Gressel, and in an effort to halt Gressel’s attack and get back the bouncing ball, Torres handled it.
Torres seemed to get away with the hand ball, the game went on, and Lewis Morgan scored on the other end to give Miami a 2-0 lead in the 51st minute. The video assistant referee asked referee Rubiel Vazquez to review the sequence on the video monitor.
Vazquez slapped Torres with a red card for “denying an obvious goal-scoring opportunity,” and disallowed Morgan’s goal because the ball would not have gotten to Morgan if the hand ball had been called in live time.
Shortly after Torres’ ejection, Victor Ulloa was called for a foul in the box, D.C. United scored on the penalty kick and two minutes later, after a long-range free kick, D.C. scored again. As if that wasn’t painful enough, Torres is suspended for Saturday’s home opener.
This story was originally published March 8, 2020 at 5:37 PM.