OK, I may be the only one who finds this humorous, but Carter Augustine just interviewed PV before the 2nd half, and PV pronounced Croizet’s last name “Crow-zet”.
WOW, what a goal!! That came out of nowhere! Fantastic pass from Rubio, good 2nd pass from Russell, and what a goal by Croizet! He doesn’t score many but when he does they are impressive!
Rubio with 4 goals and 2 assists in August so far. PRETTY sure I know who the Cauldron’s Man of the Month is gonna be.
I’d give Melia the man of the match tonight. If SKC had Shuttleworth in goal and MUFC had Melia,,,, MUFC wins the game 3-1.
The Audi numbers agree. Melia was the skc player of the match by some distance. His overall score was 748, if anyone cares. Our next best Audi player was Russell, 651. After that, we had two players in the mid 400s, Opara and Croizet. We had 8 players at or above the MLS average starter line. So it was a solid performance in that way (obviously, 5 or 6 would be an average outing, so a bit above that. The numbers reflect what we saw, a scrappy but not at all beautiful game. In the overall numbers, we sat at 4280, which is okay. We've had draws at about that level. MUFC finsihed with an audi score of 3261, another sign that we were less than dominant. Teams frequently tie, and sometimes even win, with that level of performance. Best call of the night, Matt Lawrence dryly notes as a ball comes to Gerso in a dangerous spot in the box (about 10 from goal) that "his touch let him down a bit, just put it a couple yards too far in front of him." It seemed to be that sort of night for him. Now, his runs opened up some space. He looked fast, as he usually does, and defensively he looked exceptionally fast at times. But he only had 34 successful passes, indicating he wasn't overly involved. He only missed on 6 passes, and oddly three of those were in the defensive half. Ilie, uhm. Well, first, yes, he did play. He lobbed 13 long passes forward, five connected. Overall, he only had 39 other successful passes (only missed on 7) but only had a total of 4 passes in the final third. That's a sign that SKC isn't quite clicking. When we are, he's far more involved. Watching the game, MUFC was keeping a body on him at all times, so credit to them. Thje lowest score for any 90 minute SKC player was Besler's 36 (Busio, quite impressive in his cameo IMO only managed to collect 30). Watching the game, I thought Besler was good, so I'm assuming his is a case where the numbers don't tell the whole story. But the biggest negative for him: He lost 3 aerial battles, won 2. He only had one unsuccesful pass in the defensive half, but lost his only tackle attempt and lost his only attempt at a challenge. He did intercept three balls, but the numbers indicate he wasn't as involved as he usually is. A total of 13 passes attemped in the defensive end (3 bad uns). In the end,, it was 2-0 that mattered, and wow, Melia is spectacular. His negatives, a bad throw and three parries that were classed as "unsafe" OTOH, they were saves, FFS, and nothing bad came of them. Hell of an August.
first off, credit to vermes for being proactive early and making a change. i think he swapped on a lesser player, but it was tactical with a specific purpose in mind and it worked... well, for the most part. it got the goal, so if that's your only barometer, then that's all that really matters. however, a better keeper makes that save, and croizet was not very good after that (even though i think one of his turnovers was a missed foul by the ref). i think, tactically, having him out there instead of felipe left us more exposed to all those chances minny kept getting in the second half. i thought rubio was invisible in the first half. his goal was well taken, but again, like has already been mentioned in this thread, i think a better keeper makes that save. it doesn't take anything away from him, as i think he did good enough to create just enough space from the defender to get that shot off. he's in a purple patch right now, so those kind of goals find their way in. i think you have to keep starting him until the goals dry up, but i worry about nemeth not getting enough minutes and what that's doing to his mentality. i don't think it'd be a bad idea to start him over gerso next week. i know we brought him back to play in the center, but i think he'd rather be out there in a secondary position than not out there at all. overall, i thought we bossed the game, while still looking disjointed. minnesota was opportunistic, and with better finishing could've actually won the game as they had better chances than we did over the 90 min. melia gets my motm.
Agreed. The first thing I said after watching that goal was that Shuttleworth should have stopped that one. Rubio will not get that kind of goal by Frei when they play Seattle.
I didn't talk about Rubio's Audi numbers. He gets 303 points for the goal. His game total was 380. I know you can't do this, but take the goal away and he was a non factor in this game (did win five aerial battles, one that probably saved a goal, so well done there). This was not his usual night. Usually he's more connected to what's going on, but 27 completed passes in the attacking end, nine missed, is still only 36 passes.
Yes, we were a bit fortunate to come away with 3 points. Excellent goal keeping by Tim Melia made the difference. If SKC play this way against good teams we'll be licking our wounds when the final whistle blows. That said, I'll certainly take the 3 points. Sometimes the soccer gods smile upon you.
That is interesting b/c I recall thinking that I saw Rubio all over the place. I was looking for that after your comparison of how Rubio and Nemeth play the center forward spot differently. They really do; good notes. Maybe it was non-productive activity that I was seeing and just didn't process it that way. Given his involvement in both goals (he got the MLS assist for the first, right) it seemed like a good night for him. We can call Shuttleworth lousy and all that, but we put shots on frame and they went it. It can happen with anyone in there.
I got the sense from this game that we were just a bit off, everywhere (aside from f'ing tim Melia who was a god). And I had a similar reaction to the numbers on Besler. the numbers said he sucked. I thought he looked pretty good. Also, I agree. Shuttleworth maybe could have stopped those shots, but he didn't. It happens. If he paried them who's to say we wouldn't have been there to tap in a rebound. It doesn't matter when they go in what else might have happened.
Nemeth looks hungry to score out there. Maybe not so hungry to run. But his quick and ready shot is a really nice change when we have so many players on the field who wait for the perfect opportunity every time. I too like what differences he brings. Rapt hoping he gets integrated and happy quickly, because I believe he has some skills that we will really need to break down stronger defenses, like Seattle this next weekend.
With all the good things Nemeth brings to the team, there is also his down side. He gets a bit sulky and slow to recover when things don't go his way or he doesn't get the pass he wants. PV needs to relight his fire so he stays completely engaged throughout the game. Nemeth needs playing time to groove in with the offensive attack. Giving him 10 minutes is not going to get him there. I know Rubio is scoring, but I am suspect of his new found scoring prowess. I don't think that the scoring fairy flew in one night 4 weeks ago and bopped him on the head with her wand and now he is scoring at will. I think he is focused and more confident, but he is still Diego Rubio. Nemeth regretted leaving Kansas City and has wanted to return ever since. Now he has the chance to make a difference and its his to take. All he needs is a starting nod from PV.
It happened in the second half of the Minnesota game when a ball was crossed in between Roger and another SKC player (Zusi I think) and neither went for the ball. PV went ballistic on the sideline and immediately told Savic to get Bucio. It looked as if PV was furious about the lack of effort from Roger during the game and that episode made him react. Bucio went in a minute later and Roger was fuming when he came off the field.