Preview: Hounds hit the road to face formidable Charleston Battery

Six months ago I found myself on a covered carriage ride, staring at the hindquarters of a majestic horse as I wound through the streets of Charleston’s French Quarter on a tour of the history and culture of this fine Southern metropolis. It was touristy, but not in an ‘Orlando resort destination’ kind of way or a ‘New York Times Square’ sort of way. I was there for a wedding, which was fine, except for a significantly stressful amount of unpleasant family drama. Overall, though, five stars. Good weather, good coffee, good food, nice people, beautiful buildings. Thank you for reading my Yelp review.

But actually you came here for a preview of their football club. You and I both know the Battery well. The Battery and the Riverhounds are the last remaining USL Championship team from the Old Guard Shield, which was originally made up of long standing USL teams Charleston Battery, Richmond Kickers, Rochester Rhinos, Pittsburgh Riverhounds, and Harrisburg City Islanders. We need some kind of new rivalry. Unfortunately, for reasons I still don’t comprehend, Cleveland doesn’t have a soccer team, because obvious we would immediately hate those guys. Although Detroit City has done a good job of being unlikeable in their first couple seasons in USL. I digress.*

The Battery had a great 2024 season, finishing second in the Eastern Conference. Forward Nick Markanich won the Golden Boot with 28 goals. They knocked the Riverhounds out of the first round of the playoffs and got past Tamba Bay Rowdies in the Conference semi-finals before falling, 2-1, to Rhode Island FC at home. They have four USL titles**: 1996, 2003, 2010, and 2012.

Markanich was sold in the offseason to a Spanish Second Division team for a low-six-figures transfer fee. But Charleston remains talented and dangerous. Head Coach Ben Pirmann has a long track record of success, including five years with NISA-era Detroit City from 2013-2018, and two years with Memphis 901 in 2021 and 2022. It’s a pretty experienced roster: the average player age is 26.8, and several guys like team captain Leland Archer and Graham Smith have been USL fixtures for a long while. In PSN’s preseason conversations, everyone seemed to think the top four in the East Conference would include the Battery.

Personnel

Hounds fans will be very familiar with left back Nate Dossantos, one of two Battery starters that rock the man bun as their hairstyle of choice – the other being Center Forward Cal Jennings. Dossantos is phenomenal two-way player, adept in both the attack and the defense. Danny Griffin, Aidan O’Toole, and Robbie Mertz will all feel the need to best their fellow teammate on the day in a test of pride.

Right midfielder Juan Torres is the flashiest player on the team. The 24-year old Colombian joined the Battery from Millionarios in his native country, which fans of the Netflix show ‘Narcos’ will recall was the home team of Pablo Escobar rival José Rodriguez Gacha, played by Luiś Guzman. He’s got a soft touch and a ferocious dribble – Juan Torres, not Luis Guzman. In his first year with Charleston in 2024, he recorded 7 goals and 6 assists; and the young winger has 1 goal, 1 assist to start 2025.

USL veteran Aaron Molloy started his US soccer life with three seasons at Penn State. Drafted in 2020 by MLS’ Portland Timbers, he never made it past Timbers 2, their USL team, and has spent stints with Forward Madison and Memphis 901 before signing with Charleston before the 2024 season. He’s a steady presence – the paradigmatic hard-working, hard-nosed, do-everything box-to-box midfielder.

Striker Cal Jennings has had double-digit goals in USL the past four seasons in a row. He’s a dribble-into-the-box threat, and also dangerous lurking at the goalmouth looking to stab it home. At 5 foot 10, though, he’s not a big headed-finish threat. So if you can keep him contained between defenders and cut off those dribble and cutback passes to him in the box, and force the Battery into wide areas for long crosses, he becomes less effective.

Tactical Outlook

Nothing mind-bending. It’s a 4-2-3-1. In attack they play with width, letting the fullbacks overlap and try and create from the wings. They prefer to possess the ball: in their first four matches they’ve led on possession in 3 games, and in the other match they had 48% possession despite having a lead from 15′ onward, which is pretty uncommon. Bob Lilley and his staff will probably want to disrupt this pattern – if a team has a clearly defined pattern and style, it makes a lot of sense to deny them the opportunity to play their style. Are the Riverhounds capable of dominating possession against a possession team? Or will they go on the road and play some old-school Lilleyball, defending in their own half and trying to nick a 1-0 road win?

Expected Starting XI

Luis Zamudia; Houssou Landry, Leland Archer, Graham Smith, Nathan Dossantos; Chris Allan, Aaron Molloy; Juan Torres, Emilio Ycaza, John Klein; Cal Jennings

—  —  —  —  —

* Welcome to a Soccer Rabbi preview of a match. It is mostly stream of consciousness and lacks the polish and editorial control of, say, a legitimate work of journalism. John Krysinsky, our saintly editor, has not reprimanded or fired me yet. But he doesn’t necessarily encourage my semi-off-topic rambling, either.

** To be fair, the 1996 USL was then known as the USISL (US Interregional Soccer League) and 27 teams, 24 of whom I had never heard of before I looked this league up. Albany Alleycats? Worcester Wildfire?