Sometimes you find yourself in one of those situations where, try as you might, things don’t work out for you. Sometimes those things shake out poorly, and other times, like Saturday against Rhode Island FC, they just don’t shake out if you’re Loudoun United. And the result, while not disappointing, makes the margins for error that much smaller, resulting in a teeth grinding in games down the road, particularly when these two teams, who currently make up the last two spots of the Eastern Conference playoff contingent, make things all the more closer for other ones in the East. For those who talk about sports or at least soccer, writing about a scoreless draw can be tough from a #content perspective, but I’ll give it a shot!

Alter egos, fighting! I think I said on DC News Now last week that Rhode Island and Loudoun were kind of like the Spider Man meme, or maybe they were puppies who discovered their reflection in the mirror the first time. Either way my point was they were more like two well-coached teams who are aware of what each other could or could not do over the course of a game.

Now what do I mean by that? Well, if you watch the game, watch how quickly Rhode Island closes on Wesley Leggett, particularly in the first half. Here’s a map of his game-leading five fouls won:

Now, even with this attention, Leggett still managed to get two shots, both of which inside the area, but were unfortunately missed. But it’s no coincidence that Loudoun only had two shots (1 of which was Leggett’s) in the first half, with Rhode Island having the better chances in said interim, in part due to how they locked down Wes.

However! Early on in the second half, Ryan Martin decided to bring Robby Dambrot off and got Abdellatif Aboukoura on, who proceded to take up a forward role while Kwame Awuah dropped back, and he managed to touch the ball more in 36 minutes than Leggett did in 69; to be clear, this is NOT an indictment on Wes Leggett’s performance! That he garnered the attention that he did is a testament to how well he’s playing and how much attention his play deserves! The team made adjustments, I imagine he’ll do the same.

And yet! The quality of chances belonged to Loudoun, all in the second half and all in the last half hour of the game. To Rhode Island’s credit, they were channeling their coach Khano Smith, who cut his teeth on Steve Nicol’s New England Revolution, knowing that coming out of a road game with a point is a good thing. When Gavin Turner drew a penalty for Zach Ryan to convert, Koke Vegas pulled out some nice tricks that worked, saving the kick in the 92nd minute which seemed like a fair result all around. These two play each other in Rhode Island on Week 31, where the stakes will be higher and I’d bet the game won’t be a scoreless draw.

Random Stat of the Day: 8, the number of shutouts Hugo Fauroux has logged with the 2024 Loudoun United side, now a single season team record.

So, where does this leave us? I said earlier that the draw made things tighter for Loudoun (34 points) and Rhode Island (34). Well, Indy Eleven (35 points) and Birmingham (35) both lost, so the former pair gained ground on the latter. Rhode Island hosts Birmingham Saturday, while Indy hosts Pittsburgh, who is unbeaten in their last seven games and is three points behind Loudoun.

Meanwhile, Loudoun hosts Phoenix, who has not scored a goal in their last four games and is trying to do what they can to reopen that frozen account. On the surface this may be the easiest of this particular quartet of games for Loudoun, but it’s not an easy out by any means, and they could find themselves anywhere from 5th to 9th in the East on a combination of results.

With a game they should be able to put away, they’re going to need to in order to maintain pace with the pack.