Sunday, June 10 • Kickoff: 4:05 PM • Clarke Stadium First trip to Canada in 2012 and Edmonton's new home, Clarke Stadium. Better turf than the junk they played on last season, but still Canadian football lines on the field. The Eddies have struggled so far, and we've outscored them 13-4 over the 6 meetings all time and have never lost in Edmonton. A winnable game but a tough road test. Watch Party at Duffy's Fort Lauderdale, they'll be there starting at 12:00 noon for the Euro 2012 games.
Stream not working. Ha! Silly me, those heathen Canadians put the game on Sunday. Hopefully they have some mo they can keep going against Edmonton.
Between the weather (at least in north Broward) and the Heat game...it's a good thing we didn't have a home game Saturday night.
cavalcade of suck best expressed by a storm blowing up right when Thompson was readying the PK. Interesting line-up. Somebody had pictures..............
I loved the rain poring down on Abe for the PK, lol. Gutsey play by FC Edmonton 10 men down for the win but not the prettiest. Terrible call having Rago red carded! Good Goaltending by former Chivas USAer Lance Parker.
I hate to nitpick, but just because the match was in Canuck land, doesn't mean that we can use hockey terminology..... it is a goalkeeper in soccer, goaltender in hockey.
Ok, waited a few days to see if that could temper my total frustration at what I watched on Sunday afternoon. Let's see if it worked at all.... From the coach down to each players that saw the field, this game was an embarassment. The edge comes off ever so slightly by the fact that after listening to the Ultras Alive podcast yesterday (great show as always guys!) there were legitimate reasons why Laing and Restrepo didn't make the trip. Throw in Anderson's visa issues, and we were missing three KEY players on this squad. Why Stahl didn't play I still can't figure out and Shore should answer for, as he is our captain and easily our best defender. But defense was not the biggest problem Sunday anyway. Abe's been criticized in the past by some fans for not being effective and looking slow. Normally I don't get harsh on him, but I can't defend him this time. He was terrible. Just no other way to put it. Morales.....geez to I have to keep saying this? WHY is this guy taking up minutes? Turnovers, bad passes, easily dispossessed of the ball, often makes little effort to get back on defense when the back playing behind him makes a run down the wing. If you had no other options behind this guy I could understand being stuck with giving him minutes. But you've got Granado, Pecka, Ramos, Gebor, Otte, Motagalvan, and even Clavijo's kid who could all play in his spot. Smallish, speedy MF's is the one thing this team has tons of, it's why they traded Nunez for Stewart. Enough already. Give someone else an opportunity to improve our MF play. Motagalvan is another one who played very poorly Sunday. You get the feel from what Shore's said that he is pretty high on him. I remember back when we signed him some Rhinos fans said, yeah, good luck with that guy, we won't miss him. It's starting to look like they were right. Can he be servicable? Yeah I suppose, mostly as a defensive MF though, and I think Shanosky, Gebor, and Pecka are all better options than him already though. I didn't think Ramos played well either, but I think he was more hampered by the plastic field and the wat conditions than a lot of other players. His game is ball control and speed, and it just was not a good game or field for his style. I blame Shore for not recognizing this. Damn, I guess I could go on and on. After the PK miss (very poorly taken by Abe) we still had some good possession the rest of the first half, and give Parker credit for a brilliant save on that chance by Hassan. Outside of that one chance Hassan seemed overmatched by their defenders who easily pushed him off the ball and out of position. From then on it was simply a maater of whether we were going to be able to hold them to 0 - 0 or just lose like it ended up. We had no answer whatsoever for their defense. They were completely clueless and befuddled in the final third the entire second half. It's easy to make the excuse that we were missing four of our best players and that's a big factor in this loss. But at this level your best players could be gone tomorrow, picked up by a higher level team. You have to have depth, and for Pete's sake you've got to have a coach who recognizes things and adjusts. Abe needs to focus on coaching. We need to sink or swim with our young offensive players, Anderson, Hassan, King, and hope Herron can stop getting injured. Here's what I want to see be a more consistent line up for us going forward as I think it offers the best potential in all phases: Glaeser Blake - Stewart - Stahl - Laing Anderson - Restrepo - Shanosky - Lorenz Hassan - King This is a more offensive line up, it puts a lot of pressure on Stewart and Stahl in the back, and Shanosky as a defensive MF. But when we've played our best, it was with this type of line up, control and attack capable. Think the 2nd half of the Rowdies game where we controlled and possessed the ball for long periods battering at their defense until we broke through. And once you have a team on the ropes, this kind of group can deal the knockout punch before changing to a more defensive formation late with subs to hold a lead with guys like Gebor and Orozco.