Charlotte FC won’t know until shortly before their match Saturday against Inter Miami CF (3:30 pm ET | UniMas, TUDN, Twitter) if they will have to defend Herons leading scorer Leonardo Campana.
With the Ecuadorian forward questionable due to a leg injury and multiple additional absences for the visitors, it may be unusually difficult to anticipate Miami's formation and tactics.
But Charlotte are nonetheless returning to Bank of America Stadium, where they've built a three-match home winning streak. The venue has hosted all three of the expansion club's victories during their inaugural season, accounting for nine of the 10 points they've taken through Week 9.
“Playing in front of our people and feeling the support and the love from our people is amazing for us and it’s also scary for the opponents,” Charlotte manager Miguel Angel Ramirez said as a three-game homestand begins. “Because now they know, the opponents know how difficult it is to beat us here and how powerful is the atmosphere and the energy in this stadium.”
Herons boss Phil Neville noted that Campana, who has five of the team’s nine goals, is “50-50 for the weekend” after departing their Week 9 clash at New England early. Gonzalo Higuain is also out with a bruised thigh, while winger Indiana Vassilev is back after a Primary Transfer Window deadline-day loan from Aston Villa.
But this is Week 10, not Week 1, and Ramirez believes his team now has enough experience together to problem-solve against whatever Miami throws at them.
“This group is matured enough to face any situation,” Ramirez said. “And if they need help I will be there to tell them, listen guys, it is this way now, it is not that way.”
Charlotte will have this week's trade acquisition Andre Shinyashiki available, Ramirez said, after the deal with Colorado was completed. They're also looking to build off DP winger Kamil Jozwiak's league debut last weekend.
Miami will be without center backs Aime Mabika, Damion Lowe and Jairo Quinteros, with the latter duo each serving red card suspensions. Mabika has a hamstring injury.
In weighing how much Campana features, Neville said Charlotte's artificial turf surface is another point of consideration.
“We’ve got a lot of games coming up,” Neville said. “We don’t want to miss him for more than just this one game, so we’re going to probably take the long-term view on him. We also know how important he is to the style of play that we want to play and how important he is to the goals that we want to score in this team.”
Whatever shape Neville plays, it will be geared toward not losing the momentum Miami had with a three-match winning streak prior to their loss at New England.
“We want to bounce back as quickly as possible,” he said. “We want to get back onto the winning run that we had before and we know it’s a really tough game. We know that Charlotte have got a really good home record, but the boys have trained really well this week and they look ready for the challenge ahead.”
