lucky to stay in top 2 this long. How the hell does NYC have 4 games in hand. Nyrb with 2 in hand, I expect a drop to 5th place in the next month.
I agree with the poor subs and bench. I also think it was very silly for Ben Olsen to employ a "defend deep and counter attack " strategy and put Acosta upfront. That makes zero sense. Our defenders arent very good at passing thru the lines (or passing in general). So that forces us to play long balls to Acosta. Despite all this Arriola had the 2 best chances pf the game. We had to convert at least 1 of those to justify the tactics.
Pines was MOTM for us. Very promising performance. Ben’s tactics were stupid. What was our theory of goals? The elements didn’t fit together, at all. Has the trade deadline passed? Dom Dwyer is a bench player now. So he has a very crucial ability for an incoming player, availABILITY.
Shouldn't Pines have helped defend the back side on Atlanta's first goal? He was drawn towards Brillant, Birnbaum, and the ball, leaving five foot very little Arriola to defend a leaping, headed attempt. That said, Iike Pines' play overall, especially his height and his speed. We don't have much speed in central defense.
Not really. There was an attacker in front of Pines who was in Brillant's blind spot. So Pines went to him. That left space behind Pines. The problem was communication amongst several players, not just an issue with Pines.
Well, for the first time in my adult life - I forgot DC United had a game yesterday. It was even one of the rare games on TV that I could have taped to watch when I got home Sunday night. Instead I was surprised when I caught the score on WTOP while searching for weather reports on my way home from the mountains. Even though this wasn't a Flo game, I blame the Flo deal for ultimately making me really not consider keeping up with away games as strictly as I always have in the past. That and my desire to try to escape the heat/humidity. Even though it seems I was lucky to miss this, I feel terrible about it and really wish I could watch it. Oh well.
I feel very disconnected to our away games/FLO games. I thought it was a 7pm start, was suprised to see it listed as a live event on ESPN+.
Wow, I don't think you could have summed up my sentiments on the subject any better. I hadn't thought much about it really, but there were a healthy number of national broadcasts, I haven't been nearly as motivated to go watch them. In the past, I wouldn't have thought twice about grabbing little PSU and going back to the house for the 2 hours to watch the game and return to the pool on a day like yesterday. Now the televised games are nice to haves, when they are on and I remember or give a shit.
Good response. We had 3 CBs, and all were pulled out on the right for that sequence. Pines looked to be covering J. Martinez, IIRC, so that's defensible individually, but someone has to cover for it. I'm going to buck the grain and say the tactics were fine (maybe better than fine). We were on the road, on turf for the second consecutive game, playing against a better team (especially without Rooney there's a talent gap there) and not only held the scoreline, but ground the opposition into unimaginativeness for 89 minutes, and in fact our countering opportunities were some of the best of the afternoon. AUFC's weakness is exactly that they are prone to possession without real purpose, and just what happened for the vast majority of the night. We switched off once, and paid the price for it.
Someone on Twitter observed that subs weren't made and that there was virtually no one worth a damn on the bench to sub in. Which for me begs a question that I haven't seen many people answer. Which is the bigger sin, not having quality on the bench or not using the bench. Seems to me you need an egg to make a chicken. I see people going on about Ben and how he's not a good tactician, how he's not a good motivator, how he doesn't sub well, how he hasn't "built" any consistency. While I have my questions about Ben as a coach, none can be fully answered when he's had so few quality players for more than 2-3 years because of how we built our roster for so long and quality of those players and their ability to deliver game after game, month after month and season after season. At the end of the day, its been what, 9 years and in 7 of those 9 its a fairly easy argument that the results out performed the roster spend. Some will call me enabler, but the bigger problem is the owner who can't be fired vs the coach who can be fired. BTW, who is going to the clash of shitbag, f_ckstick owners on Wednesday? Levien vs McCourt. I feel like this needs one of those MTV claymation specials.
I understand now. Still, we had too many players watching the ball and too few paying attention to runners in the box trying to connect to the ball. But yes, I understand Pines wasn't at fault. And speaking of Pines, we need him on the back line because he has both height and speed. Our central defenders are pretty good (Brillant) and good (Birnbaum), but neither has great speed. Pines, after the slow first step common among very tall players, can motor. I don't think he would have been outpaced on Atlanta's second goal.
Funny thing Hedbal is that if I were to SPECULATE at who is most likely to be mostly to blame on the goal, it would be Hamid. It is his job to alert his defenders where the danger is coming from in that situation, and I think he did finally alert Brillant, but it was after Pines had already engaged the attacker that had slipped into the area behind Brillant ... leaving Pity with a clear run on goal. If Hamid makes that call earlier, Pines stays put, and we are not having this conversation, as Pity is NOT beating him for a header. That is what I mean about the lack of communication at the back. Sad too, because Hamid had a hell of a game.
I attended this game yesterday, and I don't think having Jara in there would have made much difference. It was clear from the stands that Jara was gassed for at least 15 minutes before Ben actually subbed him out. He wasn't running with his mark or doing the other fundamentals of defensive positioning after the 60th minute.