Hartford Athletic Down Detroit City On The Road

The Latics kicked off July on the right foot by grabbing all three points at Keyworth Stadium

Hartford Athletic claimed a valuable three points at Keyworth Stadium on Saturday night, as first-half goals from Jonathan Jimenez and Mamadou Dieng were enough for them to earn their first USL Championship road win of the season. It’s also only the Latics second win over Le Rouge, following a 1-0 victory at Trinity Health Stadium during the 2024 season.

As in the game between these two clubs a fortnight ago, Hartford took an early lead, this time through Jimenez who scored his first goal of the 2025 season and first career USL Championship goal in the sixth minute. Also much like the first goal Hartford scored two weeks ago, there was both skill and fortune in the opener. On this occasion, Deshane Beckford beat his man and drove into the box, but his cross was blocked and then pinballed around the penalty area before falling to the feet of Jimenez who hooked the ball all the way across the face of goal and past Detroit keeper Carlos Saldana.

Outside of the goal — and perhaps even including it — the opening twenty minutes were fairly sloppy with both teams struggling to hold the ball, but things began to tilt a little towards the hosts as the half wore on as they began to hold the ball a little better and build up their play, although no real chances came of it.

Despite Detroit’s improving play, it was the visitors who doubled their lead in the 23rd minute through Dieng. Michee Ngalina was forced out wide, but an inch-perfect cross found Dieng at the back post and the striker headed home the ball from close range for his sixth goal of the season in all competitions and his 17th all time for the club leaving him one behind Danny Barrera on the all-time list.

Detroit continued to work its way into control of the game, but it was actually a Hartford error that let the club truly back into it. An awkward header in the attacking third suddenly released the Detroit counter-attack, and a clever back-heel from Darren Smith found an unmarked Ates Diouf in the box for Le Rouge to pull one back.

At half-time, the Latics led where it matters — on the score-sheet — but Detroit were otherwise on top of the game having outshot the visitors 6-2 while Hartford also ststruggled to retain the ball with a pass-completion rate under 60%. Despite the lead, the visitors were desperately in need of a way to stabilize the game.

Out of the break, Hartford had the right intention. While the Latics were still struggling to hold the ball, they were getting into some dangerous areas and creating opportunities. The effort resulted in a gilt-edged chance to restore their two-goal lead when TJ Presthus was fouled in the penalty area by Abdoulaye Diop, but Ngalina — who has struggled from the penalty spot this season, missing in both penalty shootouts — had has effort saved and the score remained 2-1.

Antony Siaha did his part to preserve the lead with an excellent save in the 61st minute. Former Latic Jeciel Cedeno unleashed a wicked shot from just outside the box that appeared to be bending away from the Hartford keeper but he fully extended to make the save and push the ball out of the danger zone. Le Rouge worked the ball back into the box and a dangerous cross found Cedeno unmarked at the back post but his header was tame and Siaha was able to recover well to keep the ball out of the net.

Detroit kept pressing forward in search of an equalizer, and in light of Hartford’s recent struggles to close out games, it felt inevitable that would come, especially when the fourth official announced eight minutes of stoppage time. The eight minutes stretched on, and Haruki Yamazaki hit the post from a difficult angle in the ninth minute of added time but the hosts could not find another opportunity, and the whistle blew on a rare road victory for the Latics.

The result was enough to move Hartford off the bottom of the table in the Eastern Conference. For now, there’s more work to do, but Saturday’s result was a good one as Hartford looks to move from the bottom of the table towards the middle of it.