The Cosmos come to Brooklyn, defeat Ottawa

May 4, 2015 By Rob Abruzzese Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Lucky Mkosana’s goal during the 14th minute led the Cosmos to a 1-0 victory over the Ottawa Fury FC in the first NASL game played in Brooklyn. Eagle photos by Rob Abruzzese

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Playing in their first-ever game in Brooklyn, the New York Cosmos capitalized on an early goal to beat the Ottawa Fury FC 1-0 at MCU Park in Coney Island Saturday night.

“First of all, I thought it was an exciting night to play in Brooklyn,” said head coach Giovanni Savarese. “It was an interesting setup with all that stuff going on. I thought we had a very, very good first half. Unfortunately, we couldn’t show it a little bit more with the score.”

Lucky Mkosana scored the only goal of the game during the 14th minute against Fury goalkeeper Romuald Peiser. After the game, Mkosana gave all the credit for the play to teammate Leo Fernandes, who hit him with a strong pass from the left wing to set up the play.

“It was a great ball from Leo,” Mkosana said after the match. “All the credit to him. He said he saw me make a run and he just put in a really good ball.”

The Cosmos nearly made it 2-0 during the 85th minute when forward Raúl González Blanco found Walter Restrepo wide open for an easy shot, but the referee ruled Restrepo offsides and called off the goal.

Things got intense without that insurance goal, but the Cosmos, who dominated offensively in the first half, played strong defense to finish off the match. Cosmos goalkeeper Jimmy Maurer — who was named North American Soccer League Player of the Month for April — was credited with the shutout.

“For us, we need to impose when we play at home,” Savarese said. “We did it in the first half and then when we had the ball, we were able to find spaces and were able to keep the ball. In the second half we tried to do the same thing, but we knew that they were going to come up strong. I think some of the players that came on in the second half for them were good players who created some difficulty for us, but I’m just glad that we kept the [shutout].”

The win extended the Cosmos’ (3-0-2) season-opening unbeaten streak to five matches. They didn’t get the sellout they had hoped for at MCU Park, but they still got a good, loud crowd; the fans’ drums were heard that day echoing down Surf Avenue.