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Coming off of their first loss at home and in the midst of their first losing streak since April of 2016, New York City FC has certainly seen better days going into their Saturday clash with the surging DC United. With a growing list of injuries and otherwise missing players — most of whom are lineup regulars — the deck definitely seemed stacked against NYCFC going into the weekend.
But, sure enough, the Bronx Blues aren’t the only ones struggling with personnel. Turns out DC has also been hit the by the injury/international bug. Here is the injury report as it was reported by the Black-and-Reds:
- Suspended: None
- Suspended after next caution: M - Paul Arriola, M - Chris Durkin
- International duty: M - Paul Arriola, M - Zoltan Stieber, F - Darren Mattocks, D - Oniel Fisher, M - Junior Moreno, F - Bruno Miranda
- Injury Report: OUT: D - Taylor Kemp (labrum surgery), D - Nick DeLeon (knee injury), GK - David Ousted (elbow surgery), D - Chris Odoi-Atsem (fatigue); QUESTIONABLE: M - Yamil Asad (ankle injury); PROBABLE: F - Dane Kelly (ankle injury)
Though he isn’t necessarily their first choice right back, Paul Arriola has been called upon in the past as an emergency option. And with him gone, DC manager Ben Olson will have a hard time finding a replacement unless new signing Kevin Ellis is immediately ready to go. To complicate matters further, DCU will also be missing important players such as Junior Moreno, Zoltan Stieber, and Darron Mattocks.
Our friends over at BlackAndRedUnited seemed to indicate that because of the abundance of absences, DC United might be left to field a total squad of 16 players, two short of the standard 18.
For NYCFC, no time is a good time to be missing players like Alexander Ring or Ismael Tajouri-Shradi. But seeing that their opposition is dealing with similar issues definitely should allow them to enter game day with a mindset that the two sides are, more or less, on even playing ground.
Obviously, not discrepancies in squad numbers will matter should NYCFC not be able to finish, much like they did on Wednesday against the New England Revolution.