Preview of tomorrow's Washington Freedom match against Red Stars

In their second mid-week game of the season, the Washington Freedom travels to Chicago to face the Red Stars tomorrow at 8:30 p.m. ET. The Freedom has played the Red Stars twice so far this season, both times at home, and has accumulated a 0-0-2 head-to-head record.

The Freedom first faced the Red Stars in their home opener back in April. Going into halftime down by a goal, the Freedom refused to give up on their home turf and Becky Sauerbrunn scored the Freedom’s first goal of the WPS season off an assist from Sonia Bompastor. Yet despite playing with a man advantage in the second half due to a Chicago red card, and despite outshooting Chicago 26-8 on the game, the Freedom failed to find the back of the net a second time and the game ended in a 1-1 tie.

Things looked strangely similar one month later when the Red Stars made the trek back to D.C. The venue had changed – the Freedom was playing their second of three doubleheaders at RFK Stadium – but once again a hard-fought game ended in a draw. As in the last game between the two teams, the rematch found the Freedom up a man in the second half when Chicago midfielder Karen Carney received a red card. Unfortunately, the Freedom was unable to capitalize, and even though they outshot the Red Stars 24-9, the final whistle blew without either team scoring a goal.

This past week, both the Freedom and the Red Stars were on the road. The Freedom traveled to Boston for a Wednesday game in a face-off between the second and third place teams in the WPS standings. The only goal of the game came off a free kick by Boston defender Heather Mitts, which found the head of Christine Latham and past Freedom goalkeeper Erin McLeod. Going into the second half down by a goal, the Freedom stepped up their play and had multiple opportunities to tie the game, but as the clock wound down the Freedom was unable to score and the game ended in a disappointing 1-0 loss.

The Red Stars faced the league-leading Los Angeles Sol on Saturday at the Home Depot Center in California. Sitting at the bottom of the standings, the Red Stars fought to gain a game on the Sol but instead conceded four goals and failed to score themselves. The Sol’s Shannon Boxx and Camille Abily scored in the first half, and Marta scored twice in the second half to put the game out of reach.

The question for both teams coming into the game this Wednesday is, who will score? The Chicago Red Stars have gone four consecutive games without scoring a single goal, and have only scored eight goals this season. Their team leaders in scoring, Lindsay Tarpley and Cristiane, have only two goals apiece. The Freedom finds itself in a similar, though not as drastic, scoring dearth. After going on a run during which they scored 13 goals in five games, the Freedom has now scored only twice in their last four games. With the Freedom’s leader in points, Sonia Bompastor (3 goals, 4 assists), now playing in the backline, the Freedom has struggled to make the most of their scoring opportunities. They will look to change all that this Wednesday against Chicago, while still maintaining their strong backline that has conceded just one goal in the last three games.