HOUSTON – The first half of the Houston Dynamo’s home opener against Austin FC left much to be desired for the home club. Austin had the more apparent scoring opportunities and didn’t look like a team playing its fourth game in 12 days.
“We took the sting out of the game,” Austin FC head coach Josh Wolff said.
“We’re coming in here knowing it’s a home opener, and they’ve got a lot of new players, and I thought we managed the first half quite well. We didn’t reward ourselves with the goal.
But the second half told a different story, not just in the game, but in how Houston has played second halves this season.
In the first game of the season, against FC Cincinnati, Houston conceded a goal in the 48th minute. A week later, it gave up the New England Revolution goal in the 53rd minute.
On Saturday, Ben Olsen’s halftime message was simple — stay dialed in that first 10 minutes.
Houston did more than that. The Dynamo surged out of the second half pressuring Austin FC back into their goal and limiting them any time on the ball. It’s a message Olsen had relayed to Houston during halftime. He wanted them to continue to be direct and push them back.
“That message they put into action right away,” Olsen said.
Second half surge
It started in the 47th minute when Hector Herrera got the ball on the left side of the box. He faked a defender and blasted a shot at goal, but Austin FC’s keeper Brad Stuver parried it away.
In the 51st minute, Ivan Franco leaped to bicycle kick a ball toward the goal, but Stuver caught it cleanly. A minute later, Adalberto ‘Coco’ Carrasquilla tried his luck from just outside the box, but again, Stuver was there to save Austin FC.
Austin FC were being overrun.
“They stepped on the gas in the second half,” Wolff said.
Houston’s second-half surge was rewarded in the 66th minute. Dynamo defender Tate Schmitt sent in a cross into the box where Ethan Barthlow’s barely managed to get his head around. Barthlow’s shot deflected off former Dynamo’ Adam Lunkvist’s arm.
The handball infraction led to a penalty call after a check from VAR in the 69th minute. First-year Houston Dynamo midfielder Amine Bassi stepped up to the spot and blasted it to the back of the net.
The Bayou City club pushed for a second goal with the nil-nil draw broken. In the 85th minute, Herrera recovered a loose ball in the box and slipped a pass to Dynamo right-back Griffin Dorsey on the right wing. Dorsey settled it and returned it to a streaking Herrera in the box.
HH one-timed a shot past a Stuver for the game’s second goal and the first for Herrera.
The Dynamo had planned fireworks after the game as part of the opening game festivities, and on the pitch, the team showed them sparks.
“Today, the team realized at halftime that we were managing the game well. And that we needed to raise our intensity and energy to get a good result,” Herrera said. “We came out in the second half with that mentality.”
On the win column
The Dynamo (1-2-0, 3 points) have their first win of the season, but after starting the season on back-to-back road games. It’s one win, but the third straight solid to good performance from Houston.
“Coaches can say whatever they want, but you want to get your first win. It helps quite a bit. The mood in there [locker room] is very good,” Olsen said.
“The message now is to grow and get better and make sure that we can put this type of performance on at home consistently because I do believe it’s a recipe for getting into the postseason.”
Jesus Acevedo Jr. is the Editor-in-Chief of The Bayoucitian. He’s an award-winning bilingual journalist from Houston, TX. A graduate of the University of Houston, he has written for the Houston Chronicle, La Voz de Houston, MLSsoccer.com, and ProSoccerUSA.
Before becoming a journalist, Jesus spent his early 20s drumming his way across Houston with two bands — Shortcomings and InsertNameHere. The memories that Jesus made as a musician were the seeds that started the idea for the comedy, Houmans: The Series.