House Advances to Third Round USOC Qualifying with A 2-1 Over Wisloka Chicago

Chicago House Athletic Club advanced to the Third Round of Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup qualifying on Saturday, September 30th with a 2-1 win over Wisloka Chicago at Langhorst Field at Elmhurst University.

Coming off their impressive run in their inaugural entry in the U.S. Open Cup in 2023 competition, House received a first-round bye and opened competition this fall in the stadium where they notched a first-round tournament proper victory over Midwest Premier League foe, Bavarian United S.C. in March.

Wisloka created a few scoring opportunities early in the match but couldn’t capitalize on them before House settled in and began to take control of the match.  Alejandro Mentastil opened the scoring in the 13th minute of play off a deflection right in front of the goal. 

House doubled their lead in the 24th minute when captain, A.R. Smith scored to make it 2-0.  The goal was set-up off a hard shot taken by Kikis Avalos from the left side about 15 yards out that deflected off Wisloka goalkeeper, Krystian Sroka, right to Smith’s foot who cleaned up just to the right of the keeper.

In the 42nd minute defender, Aaron Nguyen was shown a second yellow for unsporting behavior resulting in a red card ejection, leaving House to play down a man for the remainder of the match.

“In the first half, until the red card and the first two chances they got, we were in full control of the game.  So, there’s probably 30 to 35 minutes in there that we were in full control and created multiple chances and we took advantage of two of them, I think we should have finished one or two more based on the quality of the chances created,” said head coach and technical director Matt Poland on his team’s first half performance.  “The red card came close to the end of the first half, so we saw out the end the first half still in control.  At halftime you know being down a man that, obviously, it’s going to be a fight, and everyone is going to have to dig deep and grind out a result,” said Poland.

On a hot day, with a 2:00 PM start time and the temperatures in the 80’s, Poland chose to switch up formation and try and get the most possible minutes out of the 10 remaining men on the field. “We knew there were a couple of guys that could go 10-15 more, so instead of subbing them at that point, part of that thought process is, being up 2-0, but with the red card we might go into extra time, and we don’t want to put guys in at the start of the second half that might have to play a lot of minutes,” Poland explained.

Wisloka came out of the locker room looking to take advantage of playing up a man following the break and cut into the House lead in the 49th minute on a goal from Lukasz Sulka, who had a couple quality chances in the first half. 

“It was worrisome giving up that goal in the start of the second half because you don’t want the team’s momentum to be fully lost and for them to give up, so I think the response after that was good,” said Poland.  “Guys started working harder for each other, starting to solve problems.  From there on out, it was to hold on for the ride – running until you can’t, solve as many problems as possible and if you have to go down go down and the next guy comes in to carry it the rest of the way and finish the game.”

On the shoulders of veteran leaders, House was able to hunker down defensively, taking only four shots offensively in the second half compared to 12 in the first half, and held onto the win. 

“You saw some our veteran players today, in whatever way possible they had to make plays make them – from Ale (Mentasti) coming for balls up top and working it, to AR and all the work he did in front of the goal and all the saves Tony made in goal.  Those are veteran guys who’ve been through it, they’ve experienced it and that’s why they’re here – to show not by words, but by action what it means to be a professional and that’s what you saw,” commented Poland on his veterans’ performance.

Up next for House is a third-round match-up at Taft High School on October 21st at 7:00 pm versus host and Midwest Premier League foe, Edgewater Castle F.C. Edgewater finished seventh in league play with a record of 4-2-4 for 14 points.