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Phoenix Rising FC made a visit to the Old Pueblo Wednesday to face off with FC Cincinnati, who have been training at Kino Sports Complex for two weeks. The Arizona side lost the match, 3 – 0, with Cincinnati’s Tommy McCabe, Andrew Gutman and Joseph-Claude Gyau scoring for the visitors from the Buckeye State.

It was the first chance for Phoenix coach Rick Schantz to put his team on the field, and one that came only three days after the team had its first training session for the preseason. Putting a game against a Major League Soccer opponent this early meant some change of plans.

“This is new for me. In previous years, I’ve had at least a week before the first game. We’d work on base fitness leading up to those games,” he said. “This year, we spent training working entirely on our system…when we played this match, we knew what expectations we have.”

He had his share of trialists, including a slew of ones not named for reporters in the second half. Without worrying about fitness, he was looking for competitiveness and cohesion.

“If they’ve got that, I don’t care about the result,” he added.

Despite the score line in the Tucson match, Schantz thought the team did well.

“We showed them everything,” he said. “Now after that game, I’ve got film. I’ve got good and bad. I’ve got all the phases and areas of the field.”

He was disheartened by the lack of combination play, which might be expected of a team that first got together on Sunday. Even with the zero on the scoreboard, he saw good things out of the front three, newly acquired Spaniard Santi Moar, Jamaican national team forward Junior Flemmings and Lagos Kunga, another new player loaned from Atlanta United.

In a match where the team could have been overwhelmed by a top level team that has well over a week of training up on them, Schantz saw some admirable performance by the defense.

“They were very calm and composed under pressure,” he said of his second half defensive formation. “I thought they were very strong out of the back…against a team with MLS quality players and enthusiastic in their pressure, we handled it really well.”

Rising starts their season at home against Portland Timbers 2 on March 7.

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