BETHLEHEM, Pa. – Brendan Burke beamed as he approached the press scrum, visibly delighted with his team’s 2-1 win at home on Sunday afternoon against the Richmond Kickers at Goodman Stadium.

The Bethlehem Steel FC head coach was happy with his club’s determination to bounce back after a 4-0 loss away to New York Red Bulls II, which had included an own goal only 10 seconds into the game. The disappointment of that performance came after Bethlehem dropped its inaugural home opener, as a contingent of former Philadelphia Union players now with FC Cincinnati left Goodman Stadium with a 2-1 victory.

This time around the Steel started off strongly, with Eric Ayuk scoring on a shot across his body in the 21st minute, assisted on a layoff pass by Cole Missimo. The Cameroonian celebrated in his typical fashion, executing a backflip with a smile.

“I’m feeling great,” Ayuk said after the game. “I’m so happy because a lot of fans came, and we have to make them happy. It was good. We kept talking about this game. I kept talking to [Derrick Jones] and the other guys about pressing and moving forward. We have to keep improving.”

Ayuk continued his stellar play into the second half, as he dispossessed Kickers captain Mike Callahan, then set up Jones for Bethlehem’s second goal. It was also Jones’ first professional goal.

“I feel great, I’m so excited,” Jones said. “It was my first pro goal, so I’m really happy. I think we played good. It’s not about being big or strong, it’s about playing together. We had to win this game. We were not going to lose three games in a row. We came in with a mindset of winning.

“We were going in [to the second half] to play,” he added, “to not let them score, just to play.”

 In spite of that game plan, the Steel did concede in the 50th minute off a clearance attempt on a Kickers corner that was swept home by Yudai Imura. However, Burke concurred with Jones in his satisfaction over how the team performed throughout the game, especially after the second half began.

“I was very happy with how we played after the half,” Burke said. “We talked about not dropping back into a shell. I think we continued to be dangerous and play into their end.”

In order to help control the tempo of the game, Burke made a surprising decision to put Ayuk, who is naturally a winger, in a central attacking midfield role.

“We were looking at trying to get our best defensive qualities on the field,” Burke said, “which involved getting Gabe Gissie, who is a hard worker, onto the field. He and Ayuk ate up a ton of ground. That’s what that move was all about.

“We talked about getting our back four pressed up against our midfield, and keeping it compact back to front. We did an excellent job of that against a team that seems to play a lot of diagonal balls.”

The coach also pointed to Jones as a key contributor in the Steel’s first ever home game win.

“That was by far his best performance,” Burke said. “We’ll expect more of that out of him.”

Due to call ups by the Union for this weekend’s game against the Seattle Sounders, Burke was forced to play a younger starting 11, and carry a more youthful bench, than at any point previously this season. Unperturbed by the forced changes to the roster, Burke used his team’s performance and result as a roadmap for the future.

“It’s about the little milestones in development and winning the games, for us,” Burke said. “If you can combine those two, [we’re] going to develop even faster.”