MIAMI – After being up 2 – 0 at the half, Charlotte FC collapsed in the second half against Inter Miami and gave up three straight unanswered goals to lose match. Interim head coach, Christian Lattanzio, explains his tactical decisions that he believes ended up being the wrong ones.
“Miami showed that they are a tough team to play against. Against Orlando I said to the boys they [Miami] are a team that is growing, play well, with good players and the different positions, obviously [Alejandro] Pozuelo gives them something more. but when you have the talent of [Gonzalo] Higuaín as well, that comes and can, you know, can create something always.
“But more than that, for me was the fact that we were a little bit behind and a little bit behind on each instance, there is this impression in the first half that we managed to save some situations defensively with the solidity that this thing showed on number of occasions. And that was the idea that that I had when I could see that they were again wining those 50/50 midfield [battles] and I wanted to solidify our team. Obviously, that wasn't the right choice tonight.”
One of the few bright spots on the night was CLTFC winger, Yordy Reyna, who scored the brace to give his team the lead in the first half.
“Yordy is our technical leader, he's a great player. And I'm not surprised to see him performing like that. And I think our challenge is to make sure that we put him in a situation where he can perform like that from now until the end of the season.
“But unfortunately, we didn't capitalize on these two goals. But Yordy is a very important player for us, for this football club. And I think that he can establish himself, finally, as one of the most important players in this league.”
Matches like these are the inevitable lessons all expansion teams face at some point in their inaugural season. But how a team responds to these tough moments will ultimately determine their fate.
“Unfortunately, when you try to build a club franchise, you have to go through these moments and now we show what we're made of, regrouping, and going to work again in training and fix the things that we need to fix.”
