LEXINGTON, Ky. — Lexington Sporting Club added yet another W to the win column Saturday night, its seventh in its last 10 matches. The surging Greens showcased a dominant effort in their 2-0 victory over Las Vegas Lights FC, picking up their eighth shutout while Nick Firmino and Marcus Epps found the scoresheet.
Lexington was destined for the first goal of the tilt from the opening moments, despite it taking 51 minutes to materialize. The Greens compounded 5x as many expected goals as Las Vegas in the first half and possessed 62% of the ball.
The hosts finally blew the top off the match early in the second half when Blaine Ferri found Nick Firmino with acres of space down the right wing. Firmino charged at the covering defender, backed him up and calmly tucked his shot inside the far post for his fourth goal of the season.
Just two minutes later, Marcus Epps doubled his club’s lead. He won possession in the middle of the park and freed Phillip Goodrum down the left. Goodrum patiently waited for Epps’ supporting run into a dangerous area and laid it off to the winger. Epps hit it cleanly with the outside of his boot, and his shot deflected off a defender into goal.
The score marked the third of the campaign for Epps and the 42nd of the veteran’s USL Championship career.
From there, Lexington’s staunch defense took center stage. The backline allowed only one shot on target in the second half as goalkeeper Oliver Semmle picked up his eighth clean sheet of the season, tying him for the second-most in the league.
Two LSC men made their club debuts as well — Malcolm Fry got his first runout as a substitute in the 76’ minute, and Andrew Caborn made his professional debut as a 90+2’ minute sub.
With the victory, Lexington moved to 9W-7L-4D on the season and into fifth place in the Western Conference.
GOALS
51’ LEX: Nick Firmino (assist: Blaine Ferri)
53’ LEX: Marcus Epps (assist: Phillip Goodrum)
LINEUPS
LEX: Oliver Semmle, Jacob Greene, Kendall Burks, Javain Brown, Xavier Zengue, Blaine Ferri, Aaron Molloy, Noble Okello, Nick Firmino (76’ Malcolm Fry), Marcus Epps (90+7’ Milo Yosef), Phillip Goodrum
LV: Charlie Lanphier, Themi Antonoglou (85’ Blake Pope), Aarón Guillén, Ben Ofeimu (57’ Nate Jones), Nyk Sessock, Marc Ybarra (67’ Abraham Okyere), Giorgio Probo, Carson Locker (57’ Patrick Leal), Oalex Anderson, Christian Pinzón (67’ Manuel Arteaga), Johnny Rodriguez
UP NEXT
It is a quick turnaround for Lexington Sporting Club who travels to Albuquerque to take on New Mexico United on Wednesday, Aug. 26. The match kicks off at 9:30 p.m. ET before the Greens host Colorado Springs Switchbacks FC the following weekend.
