Nice video. Teams are doing a good job this year, esp Seattle. Anyway,. I had a hard time watching them last year b/c of that field, might try to tune in this year with the new unis and Press. Katiina is like a walking billboard. I'd use her to work some of the local stations and sports talk shows. She's definitely one of the top 3 personalities in the league.
RED STARS WIN! RED STARS WIN! Just got home from the Red Stars vs. WNY Flash game tonight. And I am so happy. No one on these boards ever gives the Red Stars a fighting chance because they're so enamored with the "USWNT stars". But the Red Stars have a very good team that has good chemistry with one another and they have Lori Chalupny and Julie Johnston. It was a pleasure to watch the Red Stars again in Toyota Park. They fit in there well. Wish we could play more games there.
Okay, I usually agree with you about how people adore the teams with USWNT stars, but WNY is NOT a USWNT-loaded team. You're a bit overreacting on this one tonight. And undervaluing how much momentum people attributed to WNY after their week 1 demolishing of DC.
Dude, you are pushing this underdog thing WAAY overboard. Think about it, would you pick and team that you have never seen played yet in the season that did not make the playoffs and have a bunch of rookies or will you go with the regular season champs that just won 3-1? It's a no brainer really. And this attitude about making everyone feel ashamed for not falling in love with Chicago doesn't help anything. People like who they like and there's not much you can do to change that.
Nice win but not much offense besides the one goal. Very few shots and good chances. Very nice seeing them on real grass not artificial turf with gridiron and lacrosse lines.
Well, that just how I feel about it. Next week may be a different story. You guys talk about Seattle and Portland all day why can't I say a few things about the Red Stars?
I don't think anyone's objecting to you talking about the Red Stars. It's your dissing people who favor other teams (or who are fathers of young girls who play soccer) that is over done. Go back and read through your posts and I think you'll see what I mean. I know you don't really mean it, but it does get tiresome and actually detracts from what you have to say about the Red Stars.
I haven't seen anywhere some one have complained about you talking about Chicago. On the contrary, it is you who continues to shame fans for supporting who they like. It's an insult to the intelligence of the really knowledgeable posters here to reduce them to USWNT chasers.
OK, as I value cpthomas' opinions and many others on these boards I take your criticism of my posts from last night seriously. I had just gotten back from the game, full of emotions. My intentions truly were not to personally insult anyone but to point out that I still feel the Red Stars are a better team then people give them credit for sometimes. I even applauded Abby Wambach last night for being a class act and signing autographs after the game even though she didn't play. Since I'm a season ticket holder, I was going to do a little synopsis of my thoughts and experiences of each game afterwards. However, maybe my posts have become stale and one-sided. Maybe I don't have much to contribute here anymore. I will re-evaluate my contributions, or non-contributions for that matter, and participation on these boards.
Got it. I figured you were probably too high on the red stars win and wanted more people to feel that.
MRAD, I for one hope you continue to post after games. I enjoy your posts and probably won't get to see the team play in person until May in Boston (or maybe a week earlier at WNY if I work a half day and drive like crazy). I understand your feelings that in general fans aren't giving Chicago its due - but I just keep my mouth shut hoping the opposing coaches undervalue them as well. I have a suspicion that may have happened with WNY - although they have had a lot of new players to incorporate. Now for the game - I agree with Fanadict that neither team had much offense and if I were to rate how dangerous a team was in its shots on goal I would say WNY was more dangerous although LeBlanc handled them well. Chicago seemed to be able to get through WNYs back line quite often and needs to work on finishing. WNY's shots ranged from upper 90 to way way high and wide. I thought Red Stars controlled the game until their goal and WNY then seemed to wake up and it was back and forth thereafter. Unfortunately we had difficulties with the stream losing 10 to 15 minutes each half as the stream jumped from minute 35 to half time and again losing a chunk in the middle of the second half. I am headed to the Breakers game this evening after Easter dinner. It is a beautiful day but will be in the 40s during the game. Brrrrr!
I won't leave but I realize I need to be more timely, more factual, less emotional. My contributions lately on the women's boards have been one of a "grumpy old man". When you post on emotion all the time then when you do have an interesting experience to share or a point to make, it becomes diluted. As, I mentioned in the other thread, I have met many friends because of BS personally, from those who post to those who just read our posts and I don't want to lose those friendships and trusts. But I do need to take a step back and re-evaluate. Happy Easter!
I wish they could find a way to move JJ up in the formation. She is a difference maker - although also stellar at CB. Bywaters I thought really added danger to attack when she came on. Loved the chance to be at Toyota Park again.
LOL - That's how I feel about my posts sometimes. Question: What's your assessment of Mautz? I was very impressed with her last year when I saw her play and wondered why she didn't get more playing time. And, I see she got a start yesterday, which apparently was a little bit of a surprise to some.
I was only able to watch the first 15 minutes of the game, and then had to rush off to my own kid's game. However, I watched some of it when I got back as the whole game is on the Red Star's website. WNY may not be overloaded with NT stars, but I would rate Carli Lloyd higher than your average NT star, and I thought the defenders neutralized her pretty well, for the most part. After following Johnston for almost her entire college career, it was very exciting to see her great performance. Watching her run up to DiBernardo's cross we knew exactly what was going to happen - a carbon copy of quite a few goals scored at Santa Clara. The whole team seemed to have very good potential and we can't wait to see more. Really looking forward to Press and Tancredi showing up, also.
I thought Alyssa Mautz looked good. She is a hard worker and I felt she added more to the attack than either Adriana Leon or Jen Hoy yesterday. Hoy was unselfish runner and brought a lot of energy, I just thought she did not look like she was going to have a scoring touch during the game.
I am not yet familiar enough with the rostered defenders to answer this question. Possibly whoever it was would not have as good a skill set as Julie - but I think the team is going to have some offensive struggles while awaiting the arrival of Press and Tancredi, and I think Julie could be a huge contributor to helping power the offense for these next months.
Taryn Hemmings was their starting CB last season until she was injured. She is on the roster but still rehabbing from her ACL. Hopefully she is back soon if they want to move Johnston up. Perhaps they prefer to pair Johnston and Hemmings as Santacaterina is also coming off surgery. I do agree that Johnston could help them on offense.
I know we've argued about this before, so please don't take this the wrong way, I think you're a very valuable poster and have a lot of great posts. The problem is you act like everyone hates the Red Stars, when there's really only 2 posters who slight them. Sure I predicted that the Flash (due to their offensive output from the previous game) would win the game (although I was still rooting for Chicago to win and happy to have my game prediction be incorrect), but I picked the Red Stars to come in 3rd place for the season on the season prediction thread. Ahead of the Flash, Portland, and SBFC. There were plenty of others who also predicted they'd make the playoffs. Of course not everyone is going to agree that they will. But that's nothing against the Red Stars, there are other teams that some people feel are better. That's sports. I think that would be great. Please do.
I thought the Red Stars did an excellent job on passing out of the back to players making great runs to the corners and turning those into crosses into the box. Not all of them created shots but we had plenty of attacking in the first half especially. The one thing that could have improved our attack would have been to actually slow down and make that pass when Leon or Hoy had support in the attack in case no immediate shots presented themselves. In the second we were even able to start working the ball up the wings with short passes and creating opportunities. And if opponents want to try to stop us on the wings rather than clogging up the center circle, then we have Chalupny to run attacks through the center. The Red Stars game was more exciting than the Fire game, not that that's setting a terribly high bar, but....
Hey hey, wait there a second. I did have them making the playoffs. They do need to cut down on the long balls from the back line. They need to get the ball to their playmakers like Chalupny and DeBernardo and if they long ball, then at least they are springing players open or switching fields. When Chicago was long balling from the back line, more often then not its a turn over. If they get the ball to their playmakers, Chicago will be a dangerous team this year.