On his 177th regular season USL Championship appearance, Matt van Oekel joined an elite group of goalkeepers.
The Legion veteran became just the fourth shot stopper to register 50 regular season clean sheets in the league as Birmingham Legion held Charleston Battery to a 0-0 draw.
“I give a lot of credit to Matt,” Phanuel Kavita said. “He did a fantastic job the entire game.”
Kavita recorded a milestone of his own, making his 250th regular season USL Championship appearance, but it was his goalkeeper who took all the plaudits for the shutout. Up against the best attack in the league, van Oekel made five big saves to blank Charleston for only the third time this season.
“It gives you so much courage, it gives you so much motivation,” Kavita said. “Knowing that your goalkeeper’s going to bail you out when he needs to. Obviously, that’s his job. But when he’s able to pull out one-on-ones twice or three times, it gives you the courage and makes you want to help him as best you can.”
Charleston started the night knowing a win would return them to the top of the USL Championship standings. In contrast, Birmingham Legion are languishing in 10th place. Yet the Three Sparks did not look fazed by the apparent mismatch, taking the game to the visitors in the early moments.
Legion had a few half-chances early on, finding space in behind the Charleston defense through clever movement. However, the final ball was lacking on every occasion, with several seemingly massive opportunities never even resulting in a shot on goal.
“We had a few [chances] very early on, in the first 20, 30 minutes,” Mark Briggs said. “When you play against good teams, you can’t afford to be sloppy. And we were sloppy when those opportunities came.
“They made Matt make a save,” he added. “We were in great positions, then passed the ball over the head of the other person. … It’s not good enough. You work hard to create those moments. You’ve got to be ruthless in them.”
While Zamudio was forced into just two saves over the course of the night, van Oekel was quickly called into action for the first of his five.
In the 9th minute, the 38-year-old made a flying save off a deflected free-kick. Ten minutes later, he was saving from his own player after Moses Mensah’s clearance headed towards goal.
He then came up with a massive one-on-one stop to deny MD Myers in the 35th minute, while also sweeping well on a couple through balls into the box.
“He was fantastic,” Briggs said. “He’s a fantastic shot stopper, and tonight we’re probably very thankful to him.”
Though Briggs rolled out his now-familiar 3-4-3, one notable tweak contributed to the stalemate.
Sebastian Tregarthen, lined up as the right-sided wing back, repeatedly inverted centrally to create more of a 4-2-3-1 shape in select phases of play. Briggs explained the idea was to get more pressure on the Charleston midfield, which ultimately resulted in the two teams cancelling each other out for large portions of the game.
“Charleston are so good in the middle of the field,” Briggs said. “When you look at their midfield players, a lot of their play runs through their midfield.
“So we wanted Sebastian, instead of going flat and creating a five, we wanted him to just step a little bit higher defensively so he could put pressure on the defensive midfielder,” he continued. “And if they play the switch out, he can recover and get into position.”
Though the young Uruguayan was sometimes caught too far inside, the tactic worked for the most part in nullifying Charleston’s central threat.
After the bright opening half-hour, Legion found chances harder to create, but also shut down even more defensively. The second period saw opportunities few and far between for both sides as neither looked particularly likely to break the deadlock.
The biggest highlight of the second half ended up being in the stands, where a contingent of Welsh police officers — in town for the World Police and Fire Games — joined up with Puente 12, Legion’s hispanic supporters’ group.
Briggs substituted Preston Tabort Etaka on for Mensah — a forward for a defender — in the 80th minute, a clear sign he believed his team could win it. But it was not to be, as the Three Sparks failed to score for the third time in the Englishman’s six home games.
In the end, the game ended with barely one expected goal between the two sides.
Van Oekel’s first-half heroics kept the team in the game early on, but Briggs said he needs everyone to show similar performance levels if the team is to achieve its objectives and climb up the table.
“A point against a very, very good Charleston team, a very well-coached team, top players all over the field,” Briggs said. “But I think we saw that we have nothing to fear with anyone. But people have to start stepping up and producing and doing more.”
Birmingham Legion will not dwell long on tonight’s result, closing out a stretch of three games in a week this Saturday. The Three Sparks travel to Rhode Island, a team they have lost all three encounters against so far, for the last of the three games.
Birmingham Legion face Rhode Island at 6 p.m. Saturday at Centreville Bank Stadium. The game will be streamed live on ESPN+.
Follow Timothy Belin on Twitter/X, Instagram, Facebook or Bluesky for more Legion coverage.
Leave a Reply