Louisville City fell by a goal to Bethlehem Steel Saturday night at Slugger Field. A 26′ blast from just outside the box by Walter Cortes was the only score during a frustrating night for LouCity.
LouCity put a lot of pressure on Bethlehem goalie, Tomás Romero, early in the game, but the Boys in Purple were unable to convert.
“We had a lot of opportunities that we didn’t even get a shot off on,” Louisville City coach John Hackworth said. “We didn’t test their goalkeeper in a way that made him make a really tough save. We put it at him every time, and that’s just execution in the final act, and we missed a lot of those.”
With that pressure, Louisville City sent 13 shots at the Bethlehem goalie in the first half, but only allowed four at Louisville City’s Chris Hubbard; however, one of those four found the back of the net in the ‘25. Bethlehem took a 0-1 lead with a little less than 65 minutes left to play.
Following the Bethlehem goal, there was an onslaught of shots by LouCity including two shots on goal by Antione Hoppenot and Paco Craig, but time and time again, Louisville City was unable to convert.
Luke Spencer said, “Honestly, besides the slow start, we did well in keeping the ball and creating chances. It just came down to creating chances. We had a ton of chances, just got to find a way to put it in the back of the net.”
Moving into the second half, it was more of the same. Shot after shot was taken towards the Bethlehem goal, and yet the Bethlehem keeper stood tall despite many Louisville City efforts.
Hackworth said, “It has to start with me. Clearly whatever I am going is not good enough right now. I have to make some changes. I flat out was embarrassed in that first 20 minutes, because that’s not reflective of the way our team is. It’s not reflective of the way we train every single day.
“It’s hard because we watch these guys and from the day I got here they are an extremely competitive group. Their mentality is really good. It’s almost as if we think that we are better than we are. We think that we can go out and go through the motions and play to the level of our opponent. We’re taking those moments for granted. We’ve taken a lot of them so far. I don’t know how many more we can take until it becomes glaringly obvious.”
Louisville City fell to the Bethlehem Steel 0-1, as tonight’s loss was the first time Bethlehem has won against the two-time defending USL Champions. Louisville City fell to 7th place in the USL Eastern Conference standings.
LouCity will head to Leesburg, Virginia to take on Loudoun United FC, who also fell tonight to the Indy Eleven, 0-2. Kickoff is scheduled for Sunday, July 28 at 7:30 p.m.
