P/I/P #17 LA Galaxy vs Philadelphia Union, 7:30 p.m. PT Wednesday July 4th

This is:

vs.

Wednesday, July 4

The Home Depot Center

Carson, California

Last Match:

LA Galaxy 3-4 San Jose Earthquakes

Last Five:

L-W-W-W-L

Galaxy Record:

6-9-2 (20 points)

Coverage:

KDOC

KWHY

1330 AM (SP)

1220 AM (SP)

lagalaxy.com

Discuss.

By the way, as a side note, I will let RiceBubble take it from here starting with Chicago on July 8. Thanks all.

This obviously won't be your last. Once school starts up again, I could do with a lot of help all around

LA win 3-1, Union suck right now ang Galaxy are mad cuz they lost at SJ. Oh and Beckham is SUSPENDED for this game for his EPIC Accuracy at kicking the ball to a flopping SJ player!

PM me at your best convenience if you want me to start up the PIPs again.

Omar where are you?? We need some stability!

With the team that got put out against SJ, even with Sarvas replacing Beckham, we should be beating the Union. PERIOD.

I'd like to see us unload some goals on them. And, oh, yes, we could use another shutout.

I'd sit Juninho for Stevens.

Don't think that's making us better unless Stephens actually completes a forward pass at some point and doesn't run around like a chicken a half step behind the play and send hospital balls.

I'd rather have Juninho and Sarvas in. If the Union are as abject as they seem, Juninho should be able to deal with them (hopefully not famous last words).

More concerned about the speed of Chicago this weekend.

Best thing for this team is to hit the ground running I think. We scored three goals in the last game, which is a positive. Lock down midfield defending and we should be in good shape. I'm positive about this game.

I know you've got a thing about Stephens being terrible, but what about Juninho's form? He's had a couple of good games, but maybe he needs to sit until he learns to stay with his man.

Do we sit AJ as well then? He cost us two goals against SJ.

Gaul is back, pair him with AJ.

AJ is making errors, but Juni seems to have a lack of energy.

Thank god we have a short week to put the San Jose result behind us. Here is hoping for a victory! If anyone needs a pair of tickets, please see the ticket exchange thread.

Stephens is not a good choice to replace Juni. We don't want another Passback Pete.

We need to put Bryan Jordan in. He was in the first two games of our three game run last week. He is the missing link.

Please see my posts from the Earthquakes game where I specifically call Juninho out. I didn't spare any words either. I'd rather see Sarvas over Stephens and Juninho right now.

Stephens is not very good. I've stated it before and will restate it here. Stephens was promising his first year and I had high hopes for him. However, he hasn't panned out the way I thought he would and it seems that the MLS is just passing him by. To me, he is a blackhole where the ball just goes to die once it gets to him. Unfortunately with him, it's the exception when he makes a positive pass/decision. The norm for him is, he takes too long to make a decision, which leads to the following:
1) Opportunity is missed or
2) He sees opportunity too late, yet still tries to make the play which leads to errant pass or
3) Just gets dispossessed or
4) Just makes a bad pass, via bad decision or just plain bad passing
Really hope Mikey can turn it around not just for the Galaxy, but for himself too. Honestly not sure how long he'll remain in the league if he doesn't improve his play in the next season or two.

Regarding Juninho, this year has been relatively bad for him. He hasn't been buzzing around like he was last year. There have been a handful of goals that he's personally been responsible due to poor tracking of an opposing player making a run from the MF position and marking in the box. Also, except for a couple games, his passing has just been awful and he's had trouble with his link up play. Still waiting for the real Juninho to stand up.

Very well said.

Me, too, but we're missing Becks in this game as well, so if we are going to sit Juninho, which is what I called for, then we need another player on the field.

I don't think Juni is terrible - I think he's great. But his play has been a problem for us lately and I'm calling for him to sit and hopefully get some of his concentration back. That's all. It's a moot point since I'm sure he will start tomorrow.

I don't think Mike has seen enough time on the field to make all those judgments about him. He may be all you say, but we just don't have enough data.

We'll get at least a point of this match.

I know Juninho didn't stay with his man against SJ and that was a bad mistake but I thought his passing in midfield was actually quite decent. Especially in the 2nd half I noticed he showed composure on the ball when others were starting to panic. Since so many felt he had a terrible game I went to see if at least my perception of his passing accuracy was correct. Here are the passing stats for the team, successful passes/unsuccessful:

Midfield:
Juninho: 34/9
Jimenez: 13/10
Magee: 16/8
Becks: 40/30!

Forwards:
Donovan: 28/6
Keane: 21/9

So only Donovan was as tidy with the ball. Juninho also was very active, 2nd only to Becks in # of passes attempted. And no, not all of his passes were backward. You can look at the "Chalkboard" and see they were pretty balanced.