That sucked. Glad it's over, glad for the point. It will piss me off if I see another "RSL off to their best start in history" headline just because we haven't lost. We've had an unconvincing win (of the two) and tie's, several we maybe should have lost. How may times have we given up the lead already this season? That last no-call PK should have buried us.
Nope, it was a penalty. If you have to take down a player to get to the ball, it is a foul, whether you get ball or not.
I disagree. Borchers definitely clipped his foot as he tried to slip behind him to get goal-side. The contact wasn't intentional, and was slight, but it was enough to take him down. That's a PK, but not a DOGSO, and probably a yellow.
I feel like the referee didn't want to make another big call. Right call or wrong call we really dodged a bullet. too bad we had to shoot ourselves in the foot.
Interesting game. We got lucky by not having a PK called against us late. Overall, that was one of the best refereed games I have seen. Nonetheless, its a game RSL should have won. McMath was the MOTM. I thought Garcia looked his best so far this season, but he wasn't good enough to finish off some of the opportunities he had. I hope he keeps improving. Seba really gave us a spark! I was a bit surprised to see him have a positive impact. Sabo was just a bit off...if he had been in the zone it would have made the difference today. I have no problems with Sandoval's decision to shoot. We needed more people to shoot today. So many times that last pass didn't have the class for us to finish.
Note to head coach! By all means keep Sabo in the match at all times,! Matters not if you are up a goal trying to hold a one goal lead. Keep him in! He will not help on defense! He will not be a threat on a breakaway. He will in fact do absolutely nothing when his team is up a goal. No! Please for the love of god pull Sabo for Sandoval or any other striker next match it cannot end any worse. At least Garcia was tracking back and being a force in the midfield. Sabo again did shit after his missed PK. Need a goal Sabo is a good option holding a lead he is shit.
Velasquez was nowhere near game fit. That was an awful substitution. I would have brought Balchan in for Wingert, as they were torching his wing more and more in the final 20 minutes...he also looked like he was coming back from an injury but not as bad as Seba (holy hell). The positives - we created a LOT of nice changes - which is a step up from last week. Negatives - After 40 minutes the team looked awfully tired...the D let Philly get behind us repeatedly and lost their marks repeatedly on crosses. We could give up PKs on another night. Attinella was ok in spots but came back to earth. Game management was weird (tired bodies out there, unfit bodies out there, fresh ones on the bench left untouched). The points are nice, but we traded roles from last week - the punchless offense got in gear and a stingy defense looked broken. I know Philly was pushing forward, I know they had a 4-3-3 to do exactly what they did (get wide and cross) I know their subs were offensive in nature (that DP is a player)...but we didn't show well on D - which really (IMO) was as much about midfielders not getting guys closed out - as it was about lost marks in the box twice... The build up to our second goal was beautiful though. A gem. Would have been a very memorable game winner if it weren't for the sewer backwash taste of Edu getting left alone near the spot to tie it.
Probably one of the worst games I've seen from wingert If he's still recovering from that injury it showed. I only felt keeping sabo on was important cause our D kept giving away corners so often.
Huh. I thought that Seba did really well, given how long he's been out. Not perfect by any means, but he added a spark to the attack, and was quite active in pressuring the ball as well. He was even part of the sequence that led to Beckerman's goal, and he did well to get the ball to Javi in the box. I was really glad to have him back. My complaint was that he came in for Mulholland instead of for Grabavoy. I think Grabs had a really off game (rare for him), with lots of passes to nowhere and a few bad giveaways. He just looked tired more than anything, while Mulholland still looked really active to me when he was pulled. The other thing that worries me is that we just looked slow the entire game compared to Philly. It's no newsflash that Ned, Javi, and Kyle aren't exactly the quickest guys on the pitch, but man our midfield looked slow today! This is why we struggle against KC and Philly, who live off of quick pressure on the ball to force turnovers. We don't have the speed to dribble away from them a bit to gain a little space. And, I miss Plata. I might even miss Findley, if it's the playoff Findley who comes back from injury.
Bad assumption about Balchan on my part then. I just thought Wingert looked like he wasn't all the way back. Sebastian...not gonna argue that he's a good open field dribbler - and I want to love the guy...but watch how quickly he appeared to get rubber legged and missed touches and was out of position on D. Ned and Luke ran a lot to close things out on the edges. (along with help from the forwards early on). We just didn't have that as much in the final 40 minutes, and it showed. Philly owned the wings wide and bombed balls into the box. Our poor outside backs had to chase box to line over and over on every switch.
Luckily, Philly was god awful sending in crosses except for the first goal and the near miss by Casey Conor near the end.
I think Mulholland ran really hard in the first half. He was sprinting and all over the place, to the point where I doubt he could sustain the pace for 90. I think part of why he ran so hard is because he knew before the game started that he was coming off early in the second half and knew he did not have to leave any gas in the tank for the end of the game.
Given how unpredictable a soccer game can be, I didn't think that a coach would tell a player that he was only going to play him for a certain amount, unless that player was coming off an injury and then only as a substitute.
For as good as he is getting his head on the ball on offense Sabo does seem to have a hard time putting the same head on the ball on defense.
Not arguing Sabos "defense" on the Edu goal but where's the outrage over Beltran being in another zip code on Philly's first goal. WTH?
And I was just at that moment praising Beltran for his better play. I will take full blaime for not taking the appropriate action at the time. Salt over shoulder, knocking wood etc.