Cosmos fall 5-4 to the RailHawks following a wild nine-goal second half
CARY, N.C. (September 20, 2014) – The New York Cosmos fell to the Carolina RailHawks 5-4 in a high-energy game held at WakeMed Soccer Park on September 20,2014. A nine-goal second half of the game “produced 45 of the most exciting minutes of the NASL Season”, according to a recent press release by the Cosmos reps. Why was the game such a head turner? New York and Carolina place third and fourth place in the NASL Combined Season Standings, respectively.
More from the press release:
“[This was] a game with two completely different halves,” said Cosmos head coach Giovanni Savarese after the match. “In the first half we did a very good job tactically, not to give anything to Carolina. We closed spaces very well, and we were able to go forward and be dangerous. We didn’t do as good of a job in the second half tactically, but I have to give credit to the team. We almost tied the game at the end. [It was] a crazy game.”
While the first half took a while to get going, the second half produced action almost immediately after the restart. The RailHawks opened the scoring just three minutes into the second half, when midfielder Ty Shipalane found Sandoval, who hit a low shot into the corner of Cosmos goalkeeper Jimmy Maurer’s goal.
“We were down 4-1, and we managed to come back,” said Cosmos forward Mads Stokkelien. “We had the opportunity to get one point in the end and we almost got it, but it’s good that we managed to come back in the game. We still believed we could get a good result, and we almost did it. I think that is something we have to take with us from this game.”