NASL Minnesota United FC

Stars Face Tampa Bay Rowdies Saturday

Published on June 15, 2012 under North American Soccer League (NASL)
Minnesota United FC News Release


BLAINE, Minn. (June 15, 2012) - The pitch at NSC Stadium will be a sight for sore eyes for Minnesota Stars FC. The club wrapped up a three-week, seven-game road trip last Saturday night on the sourest note imaginable, falling 5-1 in Cary, N.C. to the resurgent Carolina RailHawks. The 2011 North American Soccer League champions will look to bounce back Saturday night against the Tampa Bay Rowdies in the first of two consecutive matches in front of their own fans.

Tickets for Saturday's 7:30 p.m. match are available on mnstarsfc.com or by calling (763) 792-7355. Advance tickets start at just $6 for youth age 17 and younger and $12 for adults. Reserve and pitch-side seats are also available.

The next month will be an important period for the Stars, who play six of their next seven games at NSC Stadium, a welcome reverse from previous weeks. From May 19 through June 9, the Stars played four league games and three Lamar Hunt US Open Cup games away from home, traveling more than 17,000 miles through the air and taking the field in all four time zones in the continental United States. The travel finally told on Saturday as the RailHawks raced out to a 2-0 lead and eventually added three goals in the second half to hand the Stars the worst defeat in club history.

"Obviously you never want to be on the wrong end of a score like that because it can be very deflating," Stars head coach Manny Lagos said. "There are corrections we've had to stress this week to be able to go out and get a positive result on Saturday and beyond. We're coming up on a very important portion of our season and have a wonderful opportunity to get back on the right foot in front of our fans."

The Stars will meet a Rowdies team looking for consistency as it attempts to build on a third-place finish in the 2011 regular season. The teams met May 25 in a 0-0 draw at Al Lang Stadium in St. Petersburg, Fla., a game in which Lagos chose to rest most of his starters in advance of an Open Cup match. In that match, the Stars held their own and were well organized on defense, but the team will look for a sharper cutting edge offensively.

To that end, the Stars will look to Simone Bracalello, who has two league goals this year (second on the team) and leads the team in scoring overall with four goals in all competitions, all of which have come in the last month. The Italian forward's good form comes at just the right time for the Stars, as Amani Walker, who has three goals and three assists, is a question mark for Saturday's match as he continues to recover from an Achilles tendon injury sustained in the US Open Cup on May 29.

On defense, the Stars will need to once again contain Tampa Bay's formidable forward line, which features Daniel Antoniuk, Mike Ambersley (the third leading scorer in the NASL in 2011) and Luke Mulholland, who will make his return to Minnesota after playing an instrumental role in the Stars' run through the 2011 NASL playoffs.

Saturday will also mark the grand opening of the new Stars Beer Garden at the north end of NSC Stadium. The new standing room area replaces a temporary structure that was demolished last season to make room for a new exhibition space adjacent to the National Sports Center's Schwan Center. Saturday will also mark the first time the north entrance of the stadium will be open.

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