BTW, the crappy field helped us make that first goal. The ball just hopped over Brillant's foot and Sam alertly stole it away.
The two Central Defenders messed up. They both tried to make a 1v1 defensive play against Sam, and ended up getting in each other's way.
Uh-huh. Like some of us have saying for a long time: the 19,400 capacity at Audi Field is waaaaaaay too small. [BEEP] This is a recording. [BEEP]
I agree. I think that we benefited from the crap field, yet again. I applaud Vieira for trying to mould an offensive-minded team incorporating a possession style that starts in the back. Attacking soccer is great for the league. In order to play out of the back with regularity, defenders need to be exceptionally confident passers of the ball. In addition, there needs to be excellent movement off of the ball by the midfielders and forwards in front of defense. In my opinion, no MLS club has enough skilled defenders and high soccer IQ midfielders to play this way. Look at the real Man City that has a much higher payroll. Even they struggle with this. I recall reading some soccer stats book many years ago. I believe it claimed that over half of goals in pro soccer come off of turnovers in the defensive 1/2. It is this sort of stat that leads to teams hoofing it out of the back by whatever means necessary. I am not a proponent of the latter, and the stats may be different now as the game has evolved significantly. However, trying to pass it out of the back essentially every possession seems foolish unless you have highly skilled defenders and midfielders like a Barcelona. The RFK field conditions made this strategy even more risky for NYC and it definitely bit them in the behind on that first goal. As others have stated, I give full credit to Olsen and the team for executing intelligent high pressure on the NYC back line to create mistakes. DCU pressed, but still avoided being caught out on the counterattack. It was brilliant.
I have no idea what was on the field prior to the season, but I still believe the field is simply discolored in a few places (that are visible from high angles) more than it is uneven. It's not perfect, but many of the discolored spots simply look like divots on television.
Instead of rolling, the ball was bouncing around on those spots, and even on some of the nicer-looking places. I told Mrs. Winoman that it looked like they had beginning golfers out there for their first lessons, and didn't replace the divots.
When the ball, rolling across the ground, suddenly pops up into the air and there's no one anywhere nearby to have touched it, that's not because of discoloration.
Last week, Philly put a shot on goal to Hamid that hit one of the "patches" and he was forced to short hop it like a baseball infielder. That field is a disgrace.
I don't know what pass you're referring to. But so far this season, I've seen a rolling ball pop up for no reason multiple times.
I don't think the field has rècovered from the SheBelieves double-header. I don't think EventsDC is going to spend much on that field the rest of the season.
Right on. Carlos LLamosa's don't grow on trees in MLS. Still won't prevent me from demanding two of them for DCU.
Too many warm days and not enough snow during the winter must have confused the groundskeepers so they forgot to fix it up for the spring. Is there still a groundskeeper?
"Look, the tailgating is getting out of hand, people. Bootsy, you're cut off. AND WHO PUT THE STUFFED RACCOON ON MY CAR??!!! Oh. Ehrgh. SORRY!! Not stuffed..."