Sporting KC vs New England 7/21 7:30 p/i/p [R]

I was amazed they were even let in, they basically fell into the stadium.

Not the point.

Somehow I feel better about our chances now.

If we consider ourselves to be one of the best teams in the league it absolutely is a point.

Wow what a terrible night. The lack of creativity in Sporting's game plan is a huge issue. We just don't look like ever scoring unless it is on a set piece. No body has the confidence to run at a defense and open things up. Paolo N. is a joke and really needs to go way, to much money for that lack of talent. We need more depth in the midfield and a goal scorer.

We made it in and even held up our banner. How's that for amazing?

Your livers deserve medals of honor for their noble sacrifices.

I'm curious to know how many goals we actually have in the run of play. We have none outside of the 18. The goals this year have been unspectacular that's for sure. Sporting goal of the year thus far goes to Cesar volley. Please Cesar get a start soon.

League play - 15 run of play, 11 SP (including corners, SP, throwins, PKs)
All - 21 RoP, 15 SP

Fair enough -- we were bossed for the first half hour by a team playing a 4-6-0, and fortunate we didnt go down a goal, in spite of NE's defensive formation, respectively.

I am not trying to be captain negative. We have a good team, that's playing fairly well considering all thirds. Just nothing at the pointy end.

As others have said, we miss Bravo, or 'a Bravo.' All those "wasted" runs last year where we didnt link up with Omar... they still created openings and chances. I am 100% guilty of thinking Omar made us a little too narrow last year. In hindsight, Id like to have some of that back. Defenders are lining things up at 18 and teeing off on our crosses right now.

Along those lines: If the game plan is to play down the wings and try to score off crosses, then we have to get more than 1 or 2 guys in the box.

Sorry, that wasn't necessarily intended for you but the people being apocalyptic in general, here and on twitter. You just happened to be the person I had quoted last - I should've made it clear that it was directed at the larger group in general. Sorry.

You say that as if it's something easy to accomplish.

And I do think that we broke down the defense a number of times. We got balls into dangerous positions and simply failed to put the right cross in or players were missing from spots they should've been in. I think the number of balls that went over the box to open space is the result of players not making the run out of the midfield to beyond the back post - and I think that Peterson making his first start (and probably some of the first significant time he's had) in midfield had to do with that.

Not saying that the crosses were always great, but someone probably needs to be making that run since I prefer an overhit cross to one which can't beat the first defender.

With Convey & Zusi coming back from absences, missing Espinoza and Harrington filling in for Myers, who had played every(?) minute until Houston, it makes sense that we may not have executed as well as we would like/expect.

Dropping points at home to conference foes makes this so frustrating for me. We still have 7 home, 6 away, 3 v NYRB, 1 v DCU, HOU, CHI. Gotta get results no matter how. PV is too stubborn to change the formation much and it doesnt sound like anything else will be coming with transfers. Other teams coming into LSP are crowding our midfield and using big CB to clean up most crosses. Even GK are cheating off the line to handle crosses- Tally Hall for one. So now PV and the players have got to adjust tactics some at home to create better chances then just lobbing crosses into the box or taking off balance shots from 20 yrds. No one on the team has shown any consistent ability to hit the target from that distance, either from SP or ROP. When the team presses when an early goal doesnt come at home, I think they fall into comfortable habits instead of circulating the ball to spring a runner lose into the box . Lastly, I would like to know why tactically PV inserted olum instead of Teal. He was the last and only change of pace we had left on the bench.

I don't understand people's obsession with the formation. Change the formation, really? The formation which got us 1st in the East last year and has us in pretty good position this year still?

I mean, it's not as if we haven't spent years trying to acclimate to the system or have gone and sought out specific types of players which fit into our system.

I'm all for adding TO the system, adding different types of movement and whatnot... and actually I thought we attacked through the center more in this game than we generally do... but we're not moving away from the 4-3-3/4-5-1 until PV has been sacked.

How odd.

4-1-4-1 worked well v SJ,RSL, LAG. In the first 20' the midfield was being overrun and anytime we won the ball and looked up, there were 9 NE defenders. Zusi seemed isolated at times and surrounded by 2 defenders. Pulling the wings back and playing closer to Zusi might have pulled NE out some and created space for CJ behind their FBs. Abandoning the 4-3-3 is not an option at this point and I get that, nor am I suggesting such. But PV may have to try tactical in-game changes in order to get wins at home. The east is getting crowded at the top. Hou has changed to 4-3-3, DCU plays a diamond midfield at times in a 4-2-2, and NY has just changed their whole team with new players. Draws at home aint gonna get it done

Um, I did say 4-5-1 along with 4-3-3. We've been playing a variant of the 4-3-3 or 4-5-1 (depending on what you feel like calling it) for some time now where we move between the two concepts depending on situation.

On defense: sometimes we press high with a 4-3-3, sometimes we drop back a bit and only keep one forward up top.

On offense we are even less structured (and on purpose too). You'd have to say that the 4-3-3 is the template for it... but the wing-forwards come back, midfielders make forward runs, all three forwards switch positions with each other, outside backs and forwards switch... even our central defenders will make a foray or two into the offensive half with our midfielders rotating around and one rotating back into defense (when we do it correctly).

What you said about creating space for CJ was is accurate, and we actually HAD space behind for him to run into and he was ready and waiting to make those runs, but he wasn't rewarded for whatever reason (didn't see it, too long of a ball, or perhaps just because we tend to play that sort of game with Teal over CJ). But nothing we could do was ever going to get NE from having 8 men behind the ball at all times - there would be no drawing out when their team was being very disciplined in keeping two lines of four whenever we had the ball, and they never really put too many people forward on attack at any time. Heck, I remember a free-kick in our defensive half where they loaded the box with a grand total of 1 player. The same situation we would be putting 8 players in the box.

Anyway, as I'd said before... we actually got the ball into really great places and we just didn't have guys in the box, we screwed up the cross, we screwed up the attempt or they had a good defensive play. The crux of this problem really was, however, that when we did string some passes together to take 3 or 4 Revs defenders out of the play, they still had 4-5 defenders left to handle the 2-3 players in the box. Unless the opposition really screws up (and they didn't really have any really poor plays), that's going to be a difficult proposition every time.

^^^then execution is part of the problem?? Harrington, for example, I thought played well and hard and defensively sound but his crossess were all wrong, overhit mostly. Granted CJ by himself was usually the only target. Also there were no to few near post runs off corners and usually NE was first to the cross. We may be splitting hairs here. My issue is the team must find another way because I expect every team coming to LSP will deploy similar tactics

I actually thought that Harrington did fine with his crosses when they were overhit, but that nobody was backing up the play like I expect them to. Perhaps that's on Convey, perhaps that's on Peterson or Zusi, but someone should've been running into that space when we got the ball wide on the right.

And yes - I would like to see Harrington hit CJ on the head, but I definitely prefer overhit crosses to ones which fail to beat the first defender.

Re: defense, you are correct about how it's designed. what are your thoughts re: the lone forward chasing-at full speed-the backline horizontally for long stretches in a given match? I feel that it nullifies the effectiveness of that forward when we attack.

(If I understand what you're asking correctly

When we have both Teal and CJ available and in form, it's not as big of a deal as they are relatively interchangeable, though they tend to not aimlessly run after everything that is passed back and forth along the opposition back-2... not to mention that, while we are most definitely closer to a 4-5-1 than a 4-3-3 in defense, I'd say that the wing forwards have leeway to apply higher pressure when needed or desired... which also depends on what's going on behind them in that case (how wide the opposition is trying to play and therefore how much the outside backs have to handle).

We actually get a decent amount of dividend out of this type of pressure. It force direct turnovers, forces the opposition to hit the ball out for a throw instead of maintaining possession and can even punish a team who isn't entirely careful with their play (early @ Montreal comes to mind). If nothing else, it probably forces opposing teams to concentrate on dealing with even token high pressure for a bit in the buildup to our games and therefore is less time for them to concentrate on defending us directly.

Exactly, I feel that SKC is primarily a 4-5-1 especially during the past 8-10 games. Correct me if I am wrong, it appears as though SKC sets a defensive trap for opponents by dropping the 2 wingers just beyond the center line, thus creating a counter-attack. It looks a lot different than it did last year and earlier this year.

I played the cf position at a D1 school and played the 4-3-3. Our system was based on pressure-support-balance to prevent a switch to the weak side. A professional system that relies on the lone striker chasing, drains the attacker and is really in-effective. Thoughts?

I can think of two possible reasons for this.
1. Convey's injury, which more or less coincides with the time frame that you mentioned.
2. A conscious decision to adjust the team's playing style during this long, hot, busy stretch.