An injury that sidelined Greg Ranjitsingh at halftime of Louisville City FC’s season opener left the club in need of a replacement for its international goalkeeper. Six games later, Tim Dobrowolski has proven qualified for the job.
Heading into Saturday’s rematch with the Tampa Bay Rowdies, Dobrowolski will look to mimic his performance from a 2-1 victory back on April 15. He conceded just one goal from 15 shots, the most attempted on LouCity this season.
“You know, obviously, it was unfortunate the way Greg had to come out with the injury, but the thing is with second keepers, you know once you get your chance you want to run with it,” said Dobrowolski, the 6-foot-2 graduate of Loyola University Chicago. “I’m just doing the best I can, taking every day as a gift and giving the best I can with each performance.”
In all, Dobrowolski has allowed past him only three goals this year, one of them a fluke own goal. He has two clean sheets to his name, and a fingertip stop April 22 at FC Cincinnati led to USL Save of the Week honors.
The effort hasn’t gone unnoticed.
“Usually, I mean I’ve been on teams where the second keeper is kind of shy, just because he comes in and is not the No. 1,” said defender Oscar Jimenez. “Tim’s always had that No. 1 kind of personality to him, and that’s great because we need him to step up while Greg’s not here.”
On March 25, Dobrowolski came on to help preserve a shutout in a scoreless draw with Saint Louis FC. He made his second professional start the next week at Orlando City B and has held the job since then, with his last effort another scoreless one. The native of Illinois deflected away a shot in the 83rd minute that would have won the game for Toronto FC II.
With LouCity off last weekend, Ranjitsingh had time enough to heal that he has fully returned to training, said LouCity coach James O’Connor. But O’Connor added that Ranjitsingh appears unlikely to play this weekend against Tampa Bay with kickoff set for 7:30 p.m. Saturday in St. Petersburg, Fla.
In the meantime, Dobrowolski will continue to take advantage of the opportunity.
“Tim has been fantastic,” O’Connor said. “Tim has stepped in a long way as we knew he would. We really have tremendous belief in Tim and he’s been, for me, has performed very, very well and made some really good saves in important times for us.”
