What's with these guys too? Farfan - I forget what even happened to him. A quick google search yields nothing. It's like he fell off the face of the earth. Franklin - Foot? Same thing. No mention, fell off the earth. I know he hasn't been having the best season, but I still think he's our best fullback. Pontius - hurt himself in warmups, fell off the earth.
A lot of the 'falling off the Earth' has to do with new league rules about reporting injuries (or not reporting them as it were)
Halsti is apparently good enough to play for his national team. Granted Finland isn't exactly Germany, but still... He's played well here and there, but he's barely played at all. It's like Ben doesn't really know what to do with him. Ha can't be worse than Arnaud. I think Farfan was a hammy. Our favorite injury on this team. So he'll probably be out 6 months. Franklin is Achilles tendonitis which I can tell you from experience can be pretty debilitating. And apparently there's not really a whole lot you can do for it other than rest. Hopefully having Espindola back out there will help. I wonder how long until Saborio gets here and starts playing? I think the biggest problem with the midfield is that we've not had an attacking #10 type player in forever. At this point it's two defensive mids and NDL who's not been especially useful in quite some time and recently Doyle, who I love but who is basically a journeyman.
This. Why Ben insisted on starting Pajoy was beyond me. Pajoy was the kind of player that you'd put in with 10 minutes (or less) to go in the game (while protecting a lead), and he would pressure the opposing defenders & GK so they couldn't get off accurate passes. Doyle is the same player as Pajoy, to me. They're valuable in their own right, especially when utilized properly, but anyone who expects them to score goals on a regular basis is nucking futs.
I would disagree with the Pajoy-Doyle comparison. Doyle has a much higher soccer IQ and, I think, can develop into a Josh Gros type midfielder. The guy will go for 90 minutes, doesn't do stupid things and can chip in a goal or two along the way. Not a game changer, but a useful part of a rotating 18 man roster.
I agree. Now that he's been moved to outside mid, he's a serviceable MLS player. Not that I like him starting as much as he has the past month or so. Pajoy was just a real problem. If he's on your roster, you can be pretty sure you're a horrible team.
Jeez … I think Doyle has been abysmal … A left winger for me needs to either have speed to work the fullback or if they're left footed they need to deliver good crosses. If they're right footed they need to be able to cut inside and get shots on goal. Doyle does none of those things. Even when he gets the ball in space he will find a way to dribble into a dead end because he simply does not have the quality to unlock a defense Especially the style we play with so little attacking from central midfield we need that spark to come from the wings. If we can't get it from there either we end up where we're at with one of the worst attacks in the league.
In all fairness to Doyle, he is purely a post-up striker (the Casey Connor , Alan Gordon, etc. type). Also in fairness to him he has been played on the left side of the midfield, and he is right footed. One would think that if Ben is going to put someone to play in a position that is not natural to him that he would at least put him on his strong side and put a more established midfielder such as DeLeon on his weaker side. But Ben is Ben...