Friday, July 5, 2013
CHARLESTON, S.C. -- The Charleston Battery earned their fourth draw in four games on Friday night as played to a 1-1 tie against Orlando City at Blackbaud Stadium. 4,387 fans packed into the stadium for 90 minutes of action and a fireworks display in honor of the Fourth of July holiday.
With the draw, the Battery move to (7-3-6) and are now in lone possession of fifth place in the USL PRO standings with 27 points. Orlando City (7-6-3) remains in the top spot of USL PRO with 34 points.
“It was a really great comeback by the guys tonight and a well deserved goal by Heviel," said Battery coach Mike Anhaeuser. "Hopefully that builds our confidence going for next week, we are going to turn around and play these guys right away. It’s unlucky that we didn’t get the three points tonight but it’s better than a loss.”
Play through the first half was even between the two sides; both the Battery and Orlando City created quality scoring opportunities and were finding space through the midfield. Orlando City goalkeeper Jon Kempin made a pair of good saves to deny Mike Azira and Nicki Paterson, while Dane Kelly was also dangerous, but errent with his finishing. Orlando’s best chance of the first half came to Dennis Chin, who forced a good save from Odisnel Cooper.
Charleston began to control more of the tempo in the second half, but were stopped in their tracks by an Orlando City goal in the 56th minute. Orlando defender Rob Valentino cleaned up on the rebound in front of the Battery net and buried it past Cooper after an Orlando City corner kick had initially come back off the left post.
Orlando was reduced to 10 men in the 63rd minute as Adama Mbengue was sent off after an off-the-ball altercation with Charleston’s Jose Cuevas. The Battery pushed forward looking for an equalizer with their man advantage, but it appeared the Lions would hold on to take victory until Heviel Cordoves tallied his second goal of the season with a great effort in the 90th minute to give the Battery a late equalizer. Cordoves took a speculative shot from distance and got a lucky deflection as the ball sailed over Kempin.
Up next, the Charleston Battery will travel to Orlando, Fla. on Thursday, July 11 for a second consecutive game against Orlando City. Kickoff is set for 7:30 p.m. and the game will be streamed live at uslnation.com and on the air on 1450 AM WQNT.