On the road again. No Salloi, no Gerso, pretty sure Nemeth and Barath aren't traveling. Orlando are beatable, but the road, the short turnaround, the heat, and the injuries will make this one tough.
Are Nemeth and Barath not back to training yet? As someone who has missed the just about the entire late May to now part of the season, and to be honest, sounds like one of the better chunks of play to miss but far from the worst, I don't understand what went so wrong. Nemeth, in May, was on a pace to score 15-20 goals. It now seems that 10 would be an unexpected bonus. I mean, 8 might be more than we should expect. Salloi, last season, was a constant joy to watch. German observers were salivating. This year? WTF happened?
The whole team is a mess and there's no confidence. Especially not between Nemeth and Salloi. Both look like they have been convinced they shouldn't ever be on the field.
not that fontas is w/out blame, of course, but zusi is just as much, if not more, to blame for their 2nd goal. he was absolutely nowhere to be found, leaving an acre of space for fontas to cover. if you want to argue that zusi was just doing what he was told by pushing up that far into the attack and abandoning the defense, then that shifts the blame squarely onto vermes himself. he should know that he has a mind-boggling sluggish player on the same side of the defense as another slow player, and shouldn't be so tactically inept as to instruct zusi to push so far up. still, i'm fine with start smith as well. let smith and besler have a couple games together, assuming barath won't be back soon. see if they can't form an effective partnership.
Big picture: Prior to Seattle game, I thought that 7 more wins would give us a reasonable chance at a playoff spot, due to us playing teams immediately ahead of us (8 wins would likely be a sure thing). With the unexpected SEA (1 home loss prior to us) road win, I was feeling much better about our playoff chances coming into a winnable RSL (2 road wins prior to us) home game. With the loss to RSL, the ORL game is pretty much "must win" for us because our next game is home Sat against SJ, who: (1) have almost the same record as LAFC since SJ's opening 2-5-2 W-L-T start while they were learning their man-marking system. (2) still beat us 4-1 while learning the system during that 2-5-2 start. (3) have more speed than us at many positions on the field (which will get "interesting" when the SJ left winger man-marking Zusi during a SKC overlap attack, gets to footrace him on the SJ counter attack). (4) will be playing on 7 days rest vs SKC 3 days rest. (5) Meanwhile SKC will have just 2 days to tactically plan and practice for SJ's unique setup The odds are we should get slaughtered by SJ, and also lose on the road to ORL. But since so far it has been "opposite month" (road win v SEA, home loss v RSL), watch us win both in an ugly, non-inspiring way. LOL.
Per McDowell, PV will continue "creating high quality chances" that his low quality forwards can't finish. Groundhog day. The end is the beginning is the end. https://www.kansascity.com/sports/mls/sporting-kc/article233812432.html What in PVs 10 years as coach makes you think he will develop a specific plan to deal with one specific game?
He's done it a handful of times, EPB's first start (which was when he was forced to due to injury). Last year's USOC game in Salt Lake where he pulled out the 3-5-2 with Russell sitting underneath Belmar. That's off the top of my head so I'm sure there are more if I thought about it.
10 yrs coaching at roughly 40 games per year = 400 games Handful of games = what, 10? 10/400 = 2.5% of games with a tactical adjustment I'll bet the odds and go with "no" on PV adjusting his approach, at home, based on how another team defends.
Think Croizet's time in KC may be running out. Healthy but not in the 18 again and Medranda gets the start as the "false 9" (I actually feel like Hurtado's skill set works better on the road...) The XI. #ORLvSKC // #ForGloryForCity pic.twitter.com/056y2DaWRv— Sporting Kansas City (@SportingKC) August 14, 2019
Orlando has really dropped off the second half, if we cannot get a result then the season is truly over.
Gutierrez, only player worth a Season was over after the Open Cup exit. It's been a very predictable slow unraveling since. Sorry if you were holding out hope for something other than a relegation battle.
When the squad that played Toluca showed up against LAFC I knew this season was in trouble. I have embraced the suck and am ready for next season. My question is do they burn it all down and start anew or do they try to salvage some of the team.
that was a scintillating display of garbage, from the tactics to the players to the broadcast. pack it up, boys.
Below are my opinions, but as Buzz said the contract situation is bad. Players I would absolutely keep: Gutierrez, Russell, Gerso, Espinoza, Illie, Besler, Melia, Busio. Players that we need to absolutely move on from: Nemeth, Salloi, BF, Fontas, Croizet, Sinovic, and Zusi All others are case by case if the right offer comes along. I don't think the "wave" of SPR players that we've been sold on is coming. We have a few that are decent, but if we're hoping that SPR/Academy players are going to be the solution (short term), then we're in for a long rebuild. To be competitive again within the next two years, this is going to have to be the off season of off-seasons.
Salloi is a weird line-rider here. He was our top scorer last year and deservedly so. I can't for the life of me figure out what he needs to do to fix that, but his sell-on value is probably very low right now. I'd be fine giving him one more season (he is still cheap and young) and seeing if he can't right the ship. I agree about SPR. Vermes has talked at length about wanting to build a whole team out of academy prospects. But when even the brightest stars coming through the ranks can barely crack the first team, it's a tough sell. I was surprised by our success last year but I think that was the outlier. I think the team will have to spend a lot more to continue to compete. Which is great! Unless they don't do it.
Only think I’d change is I’d keep Salloi because of his roster status as a HGP. But he’s dropping to the bench and hoping he reverts back to the mean next year (mean being 6 goals which is about where his xG was last year and will likely finish this year).
Maybe I was too harsh with Salloi? Regardless, the list of player moves needed to be competitive again is long. SKC are fifth from bottom in the supporters shield race, which is right in the thick of relegation battle in any other league. I don't know if SKC/OnGoal/PV have the big spend in them that is required to play how Peter wants to play. If they don't spend, this year won't be the bottom. The 2019 off-season has to include a near total rebuild of the back line and the addition of a real center forward. No more BS at that position.
Yeah. 2018 went pretty well with our CFs. I had a preference between the two, but they both unlocked our wings so well. Not happening this year at all. I think we're gonna want to get rid of our older, left-behind sorts of players, but I strongly suspect we'll lose the likes of Gutierrez first. He was such a stroke of luck but if the team can't muster up some real competitivity, I don't know why he'd want to stay here.
Salloi came make a comeback if when can get a Shelton caliber hold up center forward. But at risk of starting a firestorm on the wrong thread I would at Peter to the list to go. Peter has done great things for this club but has he reached the apex of his coaching career. I have been following this team since 2007, driving up from Wichita until 2013, and having watched the entire Peter Vermes era it's my opinion that its is only downhill from here. As stated above he has really only one tactical idea. I have only seen minor tweaks and the occasional change up to our tactics. While his defensive tactics are among the leagues best, this season not included, whatever he does to coach attacking tactics sucks. Which is so frustrating when you see play like what lead to the first goal in Seattle. He never seems to adapt play to the opponent and never changes tactics in game. While I liked the fact the they came out and attacked Monterrey trying to get an opening goal, after the first goal they needed to bunker and prevent any further damage and try to score on a counter. He overplays the players. I think this is why in 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017 the script was play good at the start, fade in the final third of the season, barely make the playoffs and then loose in the first game. It nearly happened in 2018 but the injuries were not as bad. And it is this overplay that I think leads to more than normal injury issues. This is because the physical fatigue is only half the issue. Mental fatigue is the other half and there is no magical Pinncale facility that can reduce mental turn around time. Mental fatigue leads to mistakes which can lead to opponent goals and SKC injuries. A lack of player rotation also means that other teammates don't get playing time which is vital to a player getting better or to them feeling like a real member of the team. How is a player supposed to fill the shoes of first squad member if they don't get regular chances to play against quality competition. And subs, don't get me started, when he does it is often to little, to late. Now I am only talking about the coaching job. I would keep him as the technical director cause I do think that he does have a good eye for talent. He just does not manage/coach it well. Hope this post ain't to long but I needed to vent.