DCU versus Team Lex Luthor

Discussion in 'D.C. United' started by griffin1108, May 15, 2019.

  1. autogolazzo

    autogolazzo Member+

    Mar 4, 2007
    Seriously, I saw the box score and said "Yep, we got a professional tie on the road."
    No need to hear the ugly details.
     
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  2. DangerMouse37

    DangerMouse37 Member+

    Jan 22, 2004
    WDC / Barra
    True. No plan b on offense but I’m not seeing the outstanding mid play. It’s ok but we held zero possession- that’s a midfielder job, especially on the road. Our first half might actually be an mls low in history for a half. I’ve never even heard of a team with barely more than 20% possession.

    We were lucky. Good teams get lucky, but we’ve now been shut out some crazy number of games. Not a success scenario.

    Acosta has clearly checked out. His body language showed he isn’t there. He gives up on a play after a giveaway, throws his arms in the air looking for a foul or implying one of his teammates made the wrong run. He’s now looking like a full on head case. PSG and his agent may have screwed us all - including him. Bummer.

    It was so bad it was actually fun to watch but ugh. Unless you’re Canadian I suppose
     
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  3. autogolazzo

    autogolazzo Member+

    Mar 4, 2007
    Indubitably.

    "Leaves" supplanted with "Leafs."
     
  4. Winoman

    Winoman Drinkin' Wine Spo-De-O-De!

    Jul 26, 2000
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    I can see where you're coming from, but disagree about Acosta: I don't think he's playing while his heart is not in it, but rather he's trying too hard to make the difficult pass. I think he needs to stop forcing things and play the way he's capable of - by letting the game come to him.
     
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  5. Boloni86

    Boloni86 Member+

    Jun 7, 2000
    Baltimore
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    Gibraltar
    Lots of shots for Toronto, but a lot of DC bodies in the box. A times Durkin was like the 4th center back. Great performance by all those guys parked in the box.

    I'll go out on a limb and make Olsen MOTM. Solid game plan. At this stage of the season it's obvious that defense is one of the strengths of this team. There's nothing wrong with using the Bennyball card in a situation like this.

    Also like the idea of bringing on your stars early. You could tell that it forced Toronto to keep an extra body or two in defense which made it harder for them to turn the screw. They weren't dominating as much at the end as they were in the first half.
     
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  6. Boloni86

    Boloni86 Member+

    Jun 7, 2000
    Baltimore
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    Gibraltar
    The game last Sunday against SKC Acosta was working as hard as ever on defense. To me he still looks like the same Acosta as always. A little enigmatic and gets flustered too easily. But overall he just wants to play and win.

    I think the signs of frustration are just from the offense not clicking. I wouldn't read into it much more than that.
     
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  7. shawn12011

    shawn12011 Member+

    Jun 15, 2001
    Reisterstown, MD
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Gee watching the highlight package was there a new MLS rule not allowing United over the midfield stripe? There was one maybe two but I doubt it highlights of United attacking. Not sure I really want to watch the replay of this.
     
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  8. Heist

    Heist Member+

    Jun 15, 2001
    Virginia
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Don't bother
     
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  9. fatbastard

    fatbastard Member+

    Aug 1, 2003
    Lincoln (ish), Va
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    I hope some of the Toronto guys hurt themselves punching walls and things on the way to the locker room after that game, they must have been frustrated :D
    I saw the opening line-up and my gut dropped a little but my eyes widened and I was intrigued - gutsy call by the coach - and it basically worked.
    Even cooler move to brig in the 3 big guns in the second half all before the 60th - I like it. Forced Toronto to be a little more honest in the second half and not just throw everyone but one CB forward, which they seemed to want to do starting in the last few minutes of the first half. Two 47th minute subs was the most interesting, not sure I've seen subs two minutes in instead of right at the beginning. Beat our old Soehn habit of 43rd minute subs for sure ;)

    The Toronto announcers were impressed with the driving of the bus by United - I thought they may have been trying to intentionally use the announcer's curse on us by conceding the tie with plenty of time left - but I convinced myself that for "home announcers" the announcer's curse can only work on/against your team, only neutral announcers can jinx both teams equally :cool:

    Ward scared me a bit early, but he seemed to settle in okay and was fairly solid. Steiber had some great passes. I even liked Amerikwa's play for the most part, especially his defensive work, and he was just dangerous enough on a few offensive chances that he couldn't be ignored by their defense. If we played with two forwards, he'd be good as one of them.
     
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  10. griffin1108

    griffin1108 BigSoccer Supporter

    Dec 5, 2003
    Virginia
    DCU did win one statistical battle last night. Two thirds of DCU's shots were on frame, Toronto's percentage of on frame shots was only 37 per cent.:)
     
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  11. QuietSide

    QuietSide Member

    Oct 18, 2002
    Stieber showed me a lot last night...
    Several good passes. Worked hard on defense.
    I'd like to see him with the regular line up instead of Titi.
     
  12. fatbastard

    fatbastard Member+

    Aug 1, 2003
    Lincoln (ish), Va
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Plus, we were 93.7 % happier with the point :D
     
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  13. ejs1111

    ejs1111 Member

    Aston Villa | DC United
    Mar 1, 2018
    Maryland, USA
    Positive side: picked up a road point and rested many starting players.

    Negative side: obviously looked ugly doing it with so much squad turnover, team was disjointed and we parked the bus after the first 5min offensive push.

    Ward was up and down for me. Looked lively, athletic and has alot of pace. But he was frequently beaten 1v1. And numerous times he was sucked inside and WAY out of position. Good news is those things will improve with training and practice.

    I don't understand the Zoltan love on here. Aside from the 1st 5min of the match he was TERRIBLE. Yes he made a couple decent passes and 1-2s that went nowhere... but the majority of the game he was giving the ball away or chasing shadows. He was invisible for 80 minutes. Frankly I thought Olsen should have kept Amarikwa (he was having some impact with his tracking back and hustle) on and taken Zoltan off when the subs occurred. After the subs, Zoltan was even more invisible- he looked like he didn't know what position to play- midfield or forward. So he was just running around aimlessly. ;)

    Regardless... road point secured! 1st place in the East and players rested. Job done. Still feels like we dropped points though doesn't it? Toronto was a poor side.
     
  14. PSURoss

    PSURoss Member+

    Sep 30, 2002
    DC Burbs
    Ya know what's good about this ugly game? Their STMs paid for it, not us.

    A road point by any other name is still a road point that I will happily take, especially if it leaves the roster in a good place to go and compete on Saturday. I don't mind that we've got a congested schedule, but we should have played last Saturday afternoon, not Sunday night. MLS is just ********ing over the teams and the paying fans. Especially when roster construction is so constrained by the current cap structure and limitations on using charter flights.

    FTR, I had us with a 3-2 win before I knew Jozy "the battering ram" Altidore wasn't in the 18 and before I knew Ben was running out all of our deck chairs.
     
  15. Q*bert Jones III

    Q*bert Jones III The People's Poet

    Feb 12, 2005
    Woodstock, NY
    Club:
    DC United
    I'll give credit to the players for rolling up their sleeves and achieving the goal. But, again, I'll question the decision-making. Why punt in Canada when there's a throwaway game in Houston on Saturday? Unless Ben's thinking of playing 9 defenders again in Texas, which is entirely possible.

    MLS scheduling is steaming diarrhea, by the way.
     
  16. UnitedBorn

    UnitedBorn Member+

    Dec 7, 2015
    301
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    The powers that be probably wouldn't let DC United punt a game on National TV, so the option is punt Wednesday vs Toronto or Saturday vs Houston. Wednesday makes the most sense for a rest game to break the week up.

    If you rest vs Houston, you have Rooney & Co going 90 twice in a 4 day period which probably leads to the same result (or worse) vs Toronto.
     
  17. sitruc

    sitruc Member+

    Jul 25, 2006
    Virginia
    One TSN guy was definitely going for the commentator's curse the final minutes of the game when talking about United not being scored on and earning a tie on the road. It was obvious. Of course I couldn't say anything at the time because acknowledgment of his poor attempt at a commentator's curse would validate the curse.
     
  18. ejs1111

    ejs1111 Member

    Aston Villa | DC United
    Mar 1, 2018
    Maryland, USA
    Completely agree- the scheduling is just ridiculous. Cap structure is limiting teams, then you throw in flying coach instead of charter- it REALLY makes MLS look bush league. Personally I do mind about the congested schedule- too many games in a short period will force coaches to bench the high paid players to rest them- just like what Olsen did. That screws the paying customer in the stands from seeing the product on the field they were certainly expecting to see.

    MLS needs to either extend the season (start sooner) to fit all the games in or reduce the number of games. They cannot keep adding teams to this league and think 2-3 games per week is going to be the norm. This type of game is NOT typical to other American leagues. MLS is trying to act like they are the NBA / NHL / MLB. Soccer is closer to american football- it should be 1 match per week ideally.
     
  19. griffin1108

    griffin1108 BigSoccer Supporter

    Dec 5, 2003
    Virginia
    The only negative from his performance is the guy really lacks pace.
     
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  20. Funkfoot

    Funkfoot Member+

    May 18, 2002
    New Orleans, LA
    I thought Stieber made a good case for getting more playing time. The back 3 looked solid with Robinson in the middle. Ward is fast, but otherwise did not impress.

    What is the deal with making subs in the 48th minute instead of at the half? Is that supposed to confuse the other team?

    Nick DeLeon looks like a tool. Or as Ricky famously said on Trailer Park Boys, "Cockadoodle Fvcking Ketchup Head."

    35 shots without scoring is a new MLS record - congrats to TFC.
     
  21. Q*bert Jones III

    Q*bert Jones III The People's Poet

    Feb 12, 2005
    Woodstock, NY
    Club:
    DC United
    No, they didn't beat the New York/New Jersey MetroStars record of 38 (a game which they lost.)

    I kept flashing back to that astonishing display of Bennyball against Montreal a couple of years ago, when DC took 0 shots to Montreal's 30-something and United still won. That was one for the ages.
     
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  22. griffin1108

    griffin1108 BigSoccer Supporter

    Dec 5, 2003
    Virginia
    Here's what I think Olsen was trying to do. Note that he rested both outside backs which are critical to his more "offensive" formation. He also rested Titi who is a better option on the wing than Stieber. He also rolled McCann out as a DM for the first 45 minutes to see how he would fit, because on Sunday, he's missing both Durkin and Moreno. My take is that he decided that without Altidore, TFC was a team that you could get away with parking the bus. The ineffectiveness of Hamilton and the staggering lack of pace from Pozuelo made that a gamble that paid off. Houston is just too dynamic a team to just sit and park the bus, so you have to come out with a formation that can possess the ball and attack. So, I think he did what he did so that on Saturday he fields this group:

    Hamid
    Jara, Brillant, Birnbaum, Pedroso
    Arriola, Canouse, McCann, Titi
    Lucho
    Rooney

    His bench is thin because both Segura and Stieber went the full 90, as did Robinson. That leaves Ward and Amarikwa as the most "rested" of the subs and leaves Amarikwa as the only partially rested "offensive" sub. Canouse will be 3 inches shorter after this trip.
     
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  23. PSURoss

    PSURoss Member+

    Sep 30, 2002
    DC Burbs
    The part about the cap structure which drives me BONKERS is including the player fee in the salary cap. While I get it, its a remnant of the days that are long gone in this league and it needs to be done away with or phased out if the league is to be taken seriously. That DCU couldn't sign an upper middle class player like Asad this spring is a joke. Its not like they were trying to spend $50M on the guy. It was a near trivial fee on the global stage.

    The regular season is 7 months long which leaves 28-29 weeks compared to the EPL schedule which is 9 months/36-38 weeks, but at the end they're done. We've got a month, give or take to get the playoffs in, so call it 8 months. They don't stop for AFCON Nations Cup like we do for Gold Cup or World Cup so thats a big dent in the # of available weeks. I don't think there is any practical way we could follow the European calendar. Imagine sitting at game in December, January and February here? March is bad enough. Forget about Toronto, Montreal, Minnesota, Chicago and New England. Winter here vs Philly is even noticeably different. I don't know what Seattle, Portland and Vancouver are like, but you're talking about nearly half the league being impacted by Nov-Feb weather. England and most of continental Europe, I believe are more temperate than the northern states are here. At least watching games on TV from England and Germany, they don't look like they have the same degree of severe weather. And much of continental Europe takes off a month at mid-December.

    The charter thing is just a joke at this point.

    I think when you look at schedule congestion over in Europe, a third of most top division leagues have European football, they all have a domestic cup competition and most also have a league cup as well so there is plenty of mid-week soccer over there, although the Germans regularly protest mid-week league games. We just take it and deal.

    To some degree, that's just a fact of life with American sports, like playoffs, no pro/rel and host of other things which are different about American sports leagues versus European sports leagues. I think that to a significant degree, the way in which soccer is forced or perhaps chooses to operate is dictated by the model of American sports vs soccer in Europe.

    I am not looking to open the pro/rel debate here, because I get what it would do for the game, but the thing that often goes unanswered by those in favor is how would they manage and compensate for the additional financial risk that any team owner takes on with the risk of relegation and the debate usually goes dead or the answer is just a Stalinesque land grab that wouldn't actually work in the real world. Show me how you make that work and I am probably in favor, but for the time being, I am realist, Robert Kraft, Phil Anshutz (sp?) and the rest of the billionaire boys club are keeping the walls of garden as is. There would be no professional soccer in this country without the investment those guys made 25 years ago and the losses they took along the way. They're just not going to do it for the good of the game.

    I think a lot the pro/rel crowd don't remember what the soccer landscape was in this country 25-30 years ago before USA94. Ernie Johnson was the voice of Italia90. The 86 World Cup was shown on ESPN with a GIANT Budweiser boarder around the screen. On a 27" TV, which was good sized for that day, the viewing screen was maybe 14". I was in my teens and early 20s. Next to nothing was on TV. There were occasional World Series of Soccer games that came to DC, NY, Chicago, LA, etc where the US played Ajax or Juventus and the venues drew a decent crowd, but as soon as the circus moved on, it was done. Those games might not have even made it onto TV. Imagine the USMNT playing a prominent club team today, any national team playing a club team? Unheard of, it would never happen, the idea is unfathomable. Post college soccer was rough and tumble club league ball with 40 year old geezers diving into leg breaking tackles and that was the game. I played 2 years of D1 ball back then, there was almost never a game where a punch wasn't thrown as part of the game, 2 guys dueling for a ball and it was accepted, like you better be tough enough. It was like The Longest Yard with Burt Reynolds.
     
  24. Funkfoot

    Funkfoot Member+

    May 18, 2002
    New Orleans, LA
    Well the Scum must have scored a goal in that game. According to the Post:

    Toronto’s shot total was the highest in MLS in 21 years and the most in league history without that team scoring a goal.
     
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  25. song219

    song219 BigSoccer Supporter

    Apr 5, 2004
    La Norte
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    Vanuatu
    It was more than parking the bus. It was like having a walrus in the net.
     
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