Try as hard as they did the Oakland Roots couldn’t get the futbol in the back end of the net getting shutout by the Tampa Bay Rowdies at Al Lang Stadium in St Petersburg Fl on Sat Jul 8, 2023 (@oaklandrootssc photo)

By Troy Ewers

In St Petersburg, Florida, the Tampa Bay Rowdies face the the Oakland Roots in a regular season match and this game from front to back to side to side was a dominating performance from Tampa Bay as they got 3-0 victory at home locking down three points.

Cal Jennings score the first goal of the game in the eighth minute in a brilliant set up that gave the Rowdies the 1-0 lead. The first half was primarily the Roots on the defensive side of the ball trying to stop an offense that wouldn’t let up and that meant depending on a hardworking performance from Roots goaltender Paul Blanchette, but that wasn’t enough as Cal Jennings scored his second goal of the game in the 41st minute giving Tampa Bay a 2-0 lead when the half ended.

In the second half it was no different than the first as the Rowdies didn’t take their foot off the gas and in the 57th minute of the game, Cal Jennings secured a hat trick after a cross comes from the right side across the pitch and is received from Jennings and goes past Blanchette for a 3-0 deficit.

The pressure applied by Oakland in the second half fell on deaf ears as it resulted in no goals and couldn’t close the gap that Cal Jennings and Tampa Bay opened up from the opening whistle. When the final whistle blew the Rowdies took the three points and the three goals for a victory.

Next game for Oakland comes right around the corner as they play Memphis 901 on July 12th at CSU East Bay in Hayward and Coach Delgado hopes for a different result.