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Austin FC head coach Nico Estévez answering questions from media
By Phil West profile image Phil West
4 min read

'It's always special': Nico Estévez gets ready to face his former team

Even with a couple of matches when they didn't score in there, Verde's scored 12 goals in the last seven matches — a definite improvement over the early part of the season.

For a portion of last season, Austin FC head coach was looking at Copa Tejas from a more northern perspective, coaching FC Dallas. He was, in fact, on the winning side of the May 11 2-1 win over Austin in Frisco.

Now, Estévez faces his former team on Saturday night at his new home stadium, and he's looking forward to it.

"It's always special when you play against a team that you worked [for] before," he said, noting that the feeling he had playing Columbus when he was with Dallas will be similar to playing Dallas as Austin's man in charge. "It's something that my parents have dedicated me on, that is to be grateful, grateful for the people that give me confidence to be in the project and lead a project. And I think I'm always going to be grateful with all these clubs and the people that decided to give, because at the end of the day, they bet on me."

'The thing we have to work on'

He did also acknowledge, though, that this is a rivalry game — albeit one that's lost some luster now that Verde is out of the Copa Tejas running following last Saturday's 2-2 draw against Houston.

"I think all these types of games are very intense mentally," he observed. "You have to be ready for everything. And for us, it's how we can take away some of that mental part that we used against Houston and recharge, and then we can [use that] against Dallas.

"These are always unpredictable," he added. "These derby games are special. Because of that, it doesn't matter what position you are in the table, it doesn't matter what form you're coming from."

As Estévez sees it, losing the lead to draw against the Dynamo was unfortunate but is still happily uncommon for his team.

"We've had only two this season where we were winning and a team came back. It was Atlanta [on May 14], and then Houston. That in this league is something that you see a lot of times, and then I think we've done a really good job so far this year to not be in that position."

Claiming his team had control of the match until minute 86 last time out, he assessed, "We didn't handle well the quick attacks that they had; we were too open and too spread [out]. And this is the thing that we have to work on, when we don't move all together and attack all together ... because we didn't score a goal, and we conceded a goal, everyone is more pessimistic or more negative ... what we have to do is to think about how we can do better in those last minutes and then improve for the next game."

'We had good conversations'

Starting with the Colorado match on June 7 — and even with a couple of goose eggs in there – Austin's scored 12 goals in the last seven matches. That's one more goal than Verde's scored in their first 17.

Estévez says the uptick in goals is reflective of the team's reinvigorated commitment to offense.

"We had good conversations about not only the forwards scoring. It's about the full team, and then putting the fullbacks in position to score, the attacking midfielders and the wingers in position to score," he said. "If everyone had a little bit more and is more aggressive going forward ... that will help the team to score more goals and will be more dangerous, because the opponents' defenders will have to be aware of other players, and this will free space for the forwards to score."

Osman Bukari, who has been dynamic in recent matches, feels that the Toros setting up with five in the back will present him with opportunities to continue that.

"It's a good game for the wingers, because when they play five in the back ... the wingbacks are always high, so you have one against one," he noted. "We need to be focused on just playing as Austin FC, and we don't need to focus on them more. We just need to focus on Austin FC, how we have to play, how we have to score and defend.

"So now, I think yesterday and today, that's what we are doing on training, watch some of their videos, the way they move, the way they defend ... it's going to be a tough game, but at the end, we will see what is happening, but I'm sure we are going to do much better than the Houston game" — ruing the loss of a two-goal lead at several points in his turn at the mike.

Asked how he's going to hurt Dallas other than exploiting one-on-one matchups, he laughed, "I think, at the moment, I don't need to give them the tips."

Verde All Day is a reader-supported online publication covering Austin FC. Additional support is provided by Austin Telco Federal Credit Union. You can comment here if you’re a subscriber, or reach out via Bluesky.

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By Phil West profile image Phil West
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