Harrisburg City Islanders News Release - www.cityislanders.com
Saturday, May 10, 2008
HARRISBURG, PA -- The Harrisburg City Islanders fell to Charlotte tonight 1-0 in a contentious battle on City Island. A crowd of 1723 were on hand to see what turned out to be a back and forth affair with both teams grabbing the game for periods of time.
Charlotte (4-0-0) took the play to Harrisburg (0-1-3) from the opening whistle as they maintained quality possession. The chances however didn’t come as the Islanders back line was clean and stout for the first 45 minutes.
Around the 20 minute mark Harrisburg began to open up and find their legs as Ryan Heins got in around the right side of the Charlotte back line and created a few chances resulting in Harrisburg corners. The Islanders were unable to capitalize and saw out the first half with a 0-0 score line.
The start of half number two saw no changes from either bench as both teams looked to open up a gap in the others defense.
Ever probing, Charlotte began to find some rhythm with productive runs down the flank early on. In the 65th minute forward Dustin Swinehart took a quality service from the left flank down in the Harrisburg box and promptly rifled the ball on frame only to see it denied by a brilliant save from goalkeeper Danny Cepero. The rebound came right to Swinehart, who popped the ball off the crossbar, which again came back to him for a looping header over the outstretched arms of a diving Cepero.
Harrisburg quickly went on the offensive straight after the goal as Brett Wiesner, Steve Fisher, and David Schofield came off the bench to run at the Charlotte back line.
While a number of good scoring opportunities were created, in particular a break away by Fisher in the 88th minute, the Charlotte defense held and the Eagles escaped City Island with a hard fought 1-0 victory.
The Islanders will not have to wait long to earn some revenge as they will travel to Charlotte this coming Friday, May 16, to face the Eagles. They will then head to Wilmington on Saturday, May 17.
