Birmingham Legion had to settle for a draw with Hartford Athletic despite a fairly dominant performance.

The Three Sparks bossed the first half but could not find a goal to reward their efforts. While the second period was slightly more balanced, Legion had a few more big chances they failed to put away.

Newcomer Leo Duru picked up a red card in the 78th minute to reduce the Black and Gold to 10 men, but even that did not stop them attacking. As the final whistle blew, they were left to rue missed chances and two points dropped despite the numerical disadvantage.

“Proud of the boys,” Jay Heaps said. “They really fought hard and, for me, that was a game that was always on our terms. And then the red card flipped it.

“They played hard,” he continued. “There was opportunities to put the game away a couple of times. Even when we were down a man, we were the team trying to press the game. It was a good reaction from Saturday.”

Legion made four changes coming into the game, notably with the return from suspension of captain Phanuel Kavita. Nico Brown and Kadeem Cole were handed their first starts for the club, while Ramiz Hamouda came in for the injured AJ Paterson.

Despite many expecting the team to line up in the same 4-2-3-1 they had Saturday vs Tampa, the formation was instead quite unorthodox. A mix between a 4-3-3 and a 4-4-2 diamond, it featured a lopsided frontline where Gevork Diarbian hung out on the left wing, but nobody balanced him out on the right. Instead, Tyler Pasher sat at the tip of a midfield diamond comprised of Cole, Samuel Shashoua and Seth Antwi.

“We really wanted to win the midfield,” Heaps explained. “And we wanted to force them down our right side, their left side. We were trying to draw them in, and that’s when we sprung our press there.”

The idea was to force the visitors to play out from a side they were less comfortable on, while using Diarbian and Dawson McCartney’s overlapping runs to dominate the left flank. The tactic worked well, with Diarbian in particular finding plenty of joy down that wing while Hartford offered little going forward.

In the first 10 minutes of the game, Ramiz Hamouda twice sprung his new teammate forward with perfect through balls. Though Diarbian managed to cross it into the box on box occasions, nobody was there to collect the first, and Pasher failed to get the second under control.

“I know [Diarbian]’s a guy who likes to go, go, go,” Hamouda said. “A ball over the top is something I know he’ll chase every single time, and we talked about it before the game.”

Hartford’s best chance of the first half came in the 15th minute off a free-kick, but Jassem Koleilat saved acrobatically. Other than that, it was all Legion in the first half.

Diarbian threaded Romario Williams through on goal just after the 20-minute mark, but the Jamaican’s first touch let him down. The winger then had a close-range shot blocked just past the half-hour, and Brown put in a dangerous low cross in the 39th that Hartford cleared for a corner but could have just as easily put in their own net.

Perhaps the biggest chance of them all came in the 41st, when Shashoua sprung Diarbian through on a fast break. The winger ran half the pitch with defenders hot on his tail but could not place the ball past Hartford’s Anthony Siaha. Three minutes later, the same man poked a low Hamouda cross just wide of the post.

With eight shots, four corners and several more dangerous free-kicks from Hartford’s 12 first-half fouls, the Three Sparks would hardly have understood how they weren’t leading at the break.

“The first one’s sometimes the hardest one to get,” Heaps said. “But rather than overthinking the fact, [overthinking] what we did, I like that we’re getting there. I know this team will start putting chances away.”

The second half started with more of the same.

In the 50th minute, Pasher sent Brown into the box, and the fullback’s cutback went to a completely unmarked Shashoua. The Englishman could not keep it down however to place it into an essentially-empty net.

At the other end of the pitch, the Three Sparks remained solid. Hartford’s best chance came in the 72nd off a long throw, much like Tampa Bay’s goal at the weekend. But this time, Koleilat was able to make a big save to preserve his clean sheet.

Legion continued to struggle for that all-important brakthrough, and the game turned on its head in the 78th minute. Leo Duru, coming on as one of two substitute in the 70th minute, had received a yellow card for stepping onto the field too soon. Eight minutes later, he received a second one after slipping while chasing down a forward ball and colliding with Siaha.

“It looked like the referee called them on, and there was a player off the field, but because of how the scoreboard read… He ran on for a player that was off, but he was supposed to be waiting for the other player to come off,” Heaps said. “Those things, for me, are a little bit over-analyzing and over-refereeing a moment.”

Hartford looked to push their advantage, but it was Legion who still retained the best of the chances. The visitors did put the ball in the back of the net on one occasion, but the flag had gone up well before for an offside call.

“Going a man down and not conceding a goal is something very hard to do in football,” Koleilat said. “For us to achieve it and still play a good brand of soccer while we had a man down, I think that’s the most important thing.

“For me, personally, it’s a good feeling, but I think for us as a team it boosts our morale just that little bit more,” he continued. “Now we’re excited for what’s next.”

Even as the game pushed into seven minutes of stoppage time, and with multiple playes on the field who had played the full 90 just four days prior, the Black and Gold kept chasing the go-ahead goal.

A wide free-kick in the dying seconds provided their best chance but sailed harmlessly over the box.

“Very proud,” Heaps said. “We were the team pushing the game at the end there. If it had went another two minutes, I think we were going to be the team that scored. So I’m thrilled with the way we played at the end of that game, because it was not easy.”

Despite the disappointment of missing out on two additional points, Birmingham will take the positives as they record their first point and clean sheet of the 2026 campaign. With a 10-day break before their next game, they will look to get some rest, as well as hoping for the return from injury of star-striker Ronaldo Damus. Heaps said they were hopeful he could be back for the next game.

Birmingham Legion are back in action at 6 p.m. Saturday 21st March at Charleston Battery.

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