'It's going to be a collective effort': Austin FC looks ahead to a match in Canada
Jon Gallagher expressed confidence in his coach on Thursday, and talked about the effort it will require to get back to the playoff picture.
Some fans may be losing confidence in Austin FC head coach Nico Estévez during this recent six-match winless streak, but one veteran Verde player expressed confidence on Thursday.
"It's one of his greatest strengths, how much he loves and protects his players," said Jon Gallagher, speaking to Austin media ahead of the team's trip to Toronto for a midday Saturday match. "I think that, to a fault, sometimes he will blame himself rather than realizing that it's the players too. But I think that's why he's why he's a good coach, and he goes out of his way to protect us at times when we probably shouldn't be.
"I feel like the coaches aren't the ones on the field. They can give us the plan, they can give us the tactics and the ideas, but at the end of the day, it's 11 of us versus 11 of them, and we're responsible for what happens with the ball. So I would say that it's time for us players to stand up now and be held accountable."
Gallagher also noted that Estévez isn't sitting idly by during this downturn, including a pair of recent 2-1 losses that dropped Verde to 13th in the West and knocked them out of the 2026 U.S. Open Cup 90 minutes after they entered it.
"He's one of the hardest working managers that I've worked for. He really, really cares about this club and about the players, and you know he's working overtime right now to get us out of this, and it's going to be a collective effort," he added.
Still, Gallagher indicated they realize the urgency of the situation. With only six points from seven matches, Verde need to play at close to a 1.5 points per game clip the rest of the season to get into what has typically been the point total necessary to make the playoffs.
"The longer it goes on, the less comfortable you feel," Gallagher said. "I think that you see this around the world with teams where they say that, well, there's still plenty of games to play, there's still plenty of time, there's still plenty of points. But the reality is that teams above us aren't stalling. They're continuing and they're rolling, and we have to find a way to get back on the on that train line and keep up with them.
"So from us, it's not that we're going to be waiting," he added. "This is now, and this is a pivotal part of the season where we've got a lot of games in a short space of time, and we want to be looking back at the World Cup break, with the place where we're like, 'Okay, this is something to work on and to finish strong for the second half of the season.'"
'We were very down'
The team will be doing so without Dani Pereira, though, sidelined about a week with a complication from the hamstring injury the midfielder suffered earlier in the season, which manifested Tuesday forcing his exit less than 10 minutes into the match.
Meanwhile, he expressed cautious optimism about both Owen Wolff's and Ilie Sánchez's progress, indicating that they could be considered for inclusion in Saturday's match based on a Friday assessment of how they've trained.
Estévez says the team is still feeling the effects of Tuesday's loss but are generally still positive despite the downturn.
"We were very down about what happened," he said. "We wanted this to not [have] happened for the club, for our fans and and for the good memories that we had from last season in that competition. But before that, we've had three games against really good teams. LAFC and Miami, the team competed a really high level. I think even though that the game against the Galaxy, we were a little bit flat in the first half. I mean, we created expected goals. We had 1.7 and they had 0.9 and it's something that this year is costing us."
He went on to point out his team only gave up two set piece goals last year, and although they've shined there offensively, the defensive work on dead ball situations needs attention.
Going on to cite expected goal generation against Louisville, Estévez channeled former head coach Josh Wolff with some familiar turns of phrase from that era.
"What we have to see is being more ruthless in those moments," he said of the quest to turn expected goals into actual goals. "I think what we're missing is those goals can change the game, can impact mentally on the opponent, and then can open more ways to us for to score goals."
Verde All Day is a reader-supported online publication covering Austin FC. Additional support is provided by Austin Telco Federal Credit Union. For more coverage, check out Emergency Podcast! (an Austin FC Podcast) wherever you get your podcasts.
Austin FC head coach Nico Estévez thought there were more goals in Tuesday's match for his team. But he also acknowledges that the team's first-half performance did them in.
Austin FC's tough Open Cup draw against a top USL Championship team manifested in a 2-1 loss to knock them out of the tournament. That's two first-round losses in four seasons.
Austin FC plays Louisville City on Tuesday at 6 pm CT to start its 2026 Open Cup campaign. The match comes at a moment in which the team's league form is far from ideal.
Austin FC head coach Nico Estévez talked about wanting to win versus what his team actually did on Saturday. We have some troubling data points bulleted for your consideration.
Some fans may be losing confidence in Austin FC head coach Nico Estévez during this recent six-match winless streak, but one veteran Verde player expressed confidence on Thursday.
"It's one of his greatest strengths, how much he loves and protects his players," said Jon Gallagher, speaking to Austin media ahead of the team's trip to Toronto for a midday Saturday match. "I think that, to a fault, sometimes he will blame himself rather than realizing that it's the players too. But I think that's why he's why he's a good coach, and he goes out of his way to protect us at times when we probably shouldn't be.
"I feel like the coaches aren't the ones on the field. They can give us the plan, they can give us the tactics and the ideas, but at the end of the day, it's 11 of us versus 11 of them, and we're responsible for what happens with the ball. So I would say that it's time for us players to stand up now and be held accountable."
Gallagher also noted that Estévez isn't sitting idly by during this downturn, including a pair of recent 2-1 losses that dropped Verde to 13th in the West and knocked them out of the 2026 U.S. Open Cup 90 minutes after they entered it.
"He's one of the hardest working managers that I've worked for. He really, really cares about this club and about the players, and you know he's working overtime right now to get us out of this, and it's going to be a collective effort," he added.
Still, Gallagher indicated they realize the urgency of the situation. With only six points from seven matches, Verde need to play at close to a 1.5 points per game clip the rest of the season to get into what has typically been the point total necessary to make the playoffs.
"The longer it goes on, the less comfortable you feel," Gallagher said. "I think that you see this around the world with teams where they say that, well, there's still plenty of games to play, there's still plenty of time, there's still plenty of points. But the reality is that teams above us aren't stalling. They're continuing and they're rolling, and we have to find a way to get back on the on that train line and keep up with them.
"So from us, it's not that we're going to be waiting," he added. "This is now, and this is a pivotal part of the season where we've got a lot of games in a short space of time, and we want to be looking back at the World Cup break, with the place where we're like, 'Okay, this is something to work on and to finish strong for the second half of the season.'"
'We were very down'
The team will be doing so without Dani Pereira, though, sidelined about a week with a complication from the hamstring injury the midfielder suffered earlier in the season, which manifested Tuesday forcing his exit less than 10 minutes into the match.
Meanwhile, he expressed cautious optimism about both Owen Wolff's and Ilie Sánchez's progress, indicating that they could be considered for inclusion in Saturday's match based on a Friday assessment of how they've trained.
Estévez says the team is still feeling the effects of Tuesday's loss but are generally still positive despite the downturn.
"We were very down about what happened," he said. "We wanted this to not [have] happened for the club, for our fans and and for the good memories that we had from last season in that competition. But before that, we've had three games against really good teams. LAFC and Miami, the team competed a really high level. I think even though that the game against the Galaxy, we were a little bit flat in the first half. I mean, we created expected goals. We had 1.7 and they had 0.9 and it's something that this year is costing us."
He went on to point out his team only gave up two set piece goals last year, and although they've shined there offensively, the defensive work on dead ball situations needs attention.
Going on to cite expected goal generation against Louisville, Estévez channeled former head coach Josh Wolff with some familiar turns of phrase from that era.
"What we have to see is being more ruthless in those moments," he said of the quest to turn expected goals into actual goals. "I think what we're missing is those goals can change the game, can impact mentally on the opponent, and then can open more ways to us for to score goals."
Verde All Day is a reader-supported online publication covering Austin FC. Additional support is provided by Austin Telco Federal Credit Union. For more coverage, check out Emergency Podcast! (an Austin FC Podcast) wherever you get your podcasts.
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