Hops fall in Home Opener

The Charlottetowne Hops welcomed Hickory FC to the CSA OrthoCarolina Sportsplex on Saturday to kick off the NPSL campaign for both clubs. It was a hard-fought match on both sides, but the visitors did enough to take home a 2-0 win on goals from Ronan O’Mahony and Alvaro Sanchez-Gonzalez.

The hosts began a little shakily, with Hickory controlling much of the match’s possession through the first twenty minutes or so, with Charlottetowne dodging a few early half chances from Hickory to keep the score level. But it was Charlottetowne who almost opened the scoring via Tyler Schwartz, who nearly sent it past Hickory goalkeeper Jasper Rump, only for it to be cleared off the line by Maxime Wester.

For the second portion of the first half, it appeared that the score would remain level, but the first real error of the night led to the first goal.

Hops’ centerback Dawson Malcolm attempted to squirt away from Hickory’s O’Mahony, only for the visting player to the ball away from Malcolm and leave O’Mahony one-on-one with Hops’ goalkeeper Lucca Barros, who couldn’t do anything to keep the midfielders’ effort from hitting the top corner and opening the scoring for the match.

And then, just seven minutes later, in first-half stoppage time, coming from a pair of injuries to Hickory players, Sanchez-Gonzalez weaved his way through the Charlottetowne defense and created some chaos that doubled the visitors’ lead heading into halftime.

The second half saw more aggressive attacking from Hickory, but very little in the way of end product. Add to that the frequent substitutions as both teams began to tire, and it garnered a half that didn’t ever look like it would produce any more goals. In the end, Charlottetowne lost its opening match by that 2-0 score.

Charlottetowne will travel to Greenville, NC, next week to take on Greenville United, with its next home match coming on May 23 at 7:30 PM against newcomers Burlington United. Hickory FC will host Bristol Rhythm FC for their first home match of the season, followed by a trip to Boone to take on Appalachian FC.

Written by Robert Morrison