Predicted Republic Lineup vs Rio Grande Valley FC Toros

Sacramento Republic kicks off against RGVFC in just 8 short hours! There’s no telling exactly what lineup we’ll be seeing tonight, but that doesn’t mean we can’t try and guess. Here’s my attempt, tell me your guess down in the comments below.

Up top we should definitely see the continued reign of leading goalscorer Cameron Iwasa. While Iwasa is not exactly near the top of the league scoring charts, he isn’t really on the right team for that. However, he has done well this season and is one of the few Republic players that has shown a fairly consistent scoring touch.

With Adam Jahn away with the San Jose Earthquakes, the likeliest player to start up top with Iwasa is none other than the Prince of Quails, Harry Williams. Williams has one goal on the season and has come close to adding a second many times in his seven games this season. He has shown the ability to take opponents on and a tendency to make the opposition defense’s lives difficult, something that could pay off tonight.

Edit: Bill Patterson reported in the Sacramento Bee that Jahn is likely to be with the Republic tonight.

If Daniell Trickett-Smith is healthy — he was out all last week and we haven’t seen this week’s injury list yet — then it is likely that he will get the start at left midfield. My hype demands it. Danny Barrera has been doing well recently from right midfield, despite his natural position being central midfieild, and he would be a good choice there.

Edit: The injury list has come out and Trickett-Smith is out injured today.

JJ Koval and Octavio Guzman should likely be the partnership in central midfield. Koval is a key part of the Republic midfield. In Buckle’s own words, Koval brings stability and helps to protect the back line when James Kiffe and Emrah Klimenta go bombing up the touchline. Guzman serves a bit of a different role as more of a box-to-box player and has been effective on the wings as well as centrally. In fact, if DTS is still injured and unavailable, it is likely that Guzman will start out at left midfield, with Agustin Cazarez partnering Koval in the middle.

There should be no change at all along the back line from what we saw against Real Monarchs in Reno. So that means we’ll have Kiffe and Klimenta at fullback and the Chris Christian, Mike da Fonte pairing in the middle. Why no Derek Foran, you ask? Well...

That’s not really a tweet from someone that has recovered from injury.

Finally, Dominik Jakubek has solidly locked down the starting goalkeeper position so he’ll definitely be between the pipes tonight.

Here it is all layed out.

So what do you think? Let me know your predicted lineup down in the comments below.