The Spirit played the North Carolina Courage on their Pride Night at Audi Field on a last hot evening before they go on a long break for the summer and the Olympics. They won’t be back at Audi until late August and they hoped to send the 15,717 fans off with a win to remember the night by, but unfortunately a single goal by a former Spirit favorite crushed those hopes.
The Spirit were unfortunately without their stalwart midfielder, Andi Sullivan, who was on the bench to start the match with a reoccurrence of the hip injury that had left her out of the Spirit’s last home match, a last-minute 1-1 tie against the San Diego Wave. The Spirit really missed her presence in the middle of the pitch as the game started off with the Courage pressing hard through the middle while also doing their best to occupy the Spirit’s wide defenders. The tactic largely worked, with the Spirit having a hard time establishing themselves in their offensive third, and for quite a large part of the beginning of the game, the Courage controlled the ball.
This intense period finally resulted in a Courage goal when former Spirit player, Ashley Sanchez, scored against her old team on her first return to Audi. She was able to send in a high shot that looked like it might just sneak into the far post until Spirit goalkeeper Aubrey Kingsbury redirected the ball slightly as it came off her hands and the ball went right into the back of the net.
The remainder of the first half and much of the second did not have much hope for the Spirit. While the Spirit had far more shots than normal, none really challenged Courage goalkeeper Casey Murphy. But their twenty shots on goal, a number of which came in a heavy press toward the end of the match, were for naught and they were unable to get the equalizer like they had in their previous home game. And so the Spirit will have to wait until almost the end of August before they get a chance to thrill their fans with another Audi home win.
