'It gives you so much energy': How defending as a team has bolstered Austin FC

Brendan Hines-Ike loves seeing players paid to score goals working on defense.

"I get excited when I see guys that are not defenders defend really hard," Hines-Ike observed at Thursday's Austin FC media availability. "That makes me really proud, when you have these forwards tracking back and running their tails off. I'll give you an example, and we used it as a team earlier in the week, [in the] last play of the game. [Jáder] Obrian comes into the game, he pressed that center back for over a minute to prevent him from kicking the ball along. That kind of stuff is immensely important for us. That kind of things is what makes our team get to the next level. It's the dirty work, it's the boring work, but it's what makes a difference."

Hines-Ike spent much of his time Thursday talking about how the team's defensive effort has helped Austin FC to a three-match win streak and the team's current second-in-the-West standing — on the line when Verde hosts Portland on Saturday night at an unusual 6:45 pm start time.

He had special praise for new teammate Myrto Uzuni and his incredible workrate, which has been on display since he's first taken the field. While he was brought in as a goalscorer and only has one to his credit so far, Hines-Ike notes that his willingness to defend has been inspirational.

"When you see that, as someone in my situation, [or] someone who's a central midfielder ... and you see your front guys working their tails off, it gives you so much energy as a group, as a defender, to know, 'Man, those guys are working.' We've got to be right there with him; keep pushing.'"

Not perfect yet

Hines-Ike also identified what the team still needs to work on defensively — even while they've only allowed three goals in six matches, only bested by a St. Louis team they scored on and held scoreless on Sunday.

"Defensively, we're still trying to work on being a team that's defending higher up the field," he admitted. "We are very clearly good at defending in a low block, understanding that in the box, we do everything we can to prevent the goal from going in and maybe even 20 yards outside of that. But can we do that same thing, but higher up the field, build more pressure higher up the field, be a mid-block to high-block team at certain moments, high press team, if it's a opportunity, But at the same time, it's just still hammering home the small things, being in right positions for transitions you know and taking defending seriously."

He noted that last year, they spent a lot of time defending in chaotic end-of-match situations that led them to expend more energy than they perhaps needed to — leaving them vulnerable to late-match attacks.

The St. Louis game was an example of that.

"We had the 65 minutes that we played where we felt very in control of the game. And then there was the last 25 where, because we had the [weather delay] break, we immediately went into, 'Okay, it's the end of the game, and we'll just sit back and defend.' And we ended up defending way too much in the last 30 to 35, minutes, which we've talked about as a group. We can't do that anymore."

Part of that, he floated, could be remedied via offense.

"The biggest thing we've talked about is when we get into situations where we start to have a momentum and a rhythm in a game, and maybe we score a first goal, to capitalize and take another goal," he observed. "That's the biggest thing. It'll just give us a little bit of a time to let the oxygen out and know that ... because I think we are a team comfortable being in a 1-0 lead, a 2-1 lead, but we have a much bigger capacity to put these games away.

"And I think the entire team knows that, with the quality that we have, the group that we have ... We've talked about let's find moments in the game where it's five to 10 minutes, where, if we're on somebody, let's be on. Let's put this game away, put it to bed — similar to what San Diego could have been. We could have done it last week with St Louis, where we had two or three opportunities after Myrto's goal to just be like, 'All right, the game is done. You're never going to come back into it.' Now, we can sit if we want to sit; if we want to keep going, we can push."

Player updates

Perhaps the biggest piece of news coming out of Thursday's press conference from head coach Nico Estévez involved Uzuni and a different kind of looming international duty – the imminent birth of his child in Barcelona, necessitating a trip back to Spain sometime soon.

"I think in the in the next 10 days, anything can happen," Estévez revealed, noting that the decision rests with Uzuni and the team will be supportive of whenever he feels he needs to travel wifeward. The next match after Saturday's tilt against Portland is a long away trip in the opposite direction from Europe, at conference-leading Vancouver on the following Saturday (at another unusual time slot, albeit a much more forgiving 6:30 pm vs. the typical 9:30 pm West Coast road start time).

Depending on how that goes, Uzuni could theoretically miss either that match, the following match at home against the Galaxy (a Saturday afternoon match with a 12:45 pm start time), or both.

Estévez also indicated that Mikkel Desler is recovering from his hamstring injury on schedule (but don't expect him to get time on the field quite yet).

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