No Russell, Rubio, Salloi, or Opara for this one. Orlando will be without Yoshi Yotun. First sighting of Dom at CMP since he left.
According to the broadcast this past weekend no Lindsey either, apparently he's been called in to the U20 team, but I haven't seen anything about it anywhere else.
I can't imagine Shelton getting the start this soon even if he is training again. More likely a sub. So the front line will very likely be Croizet - Nemeth - Gerso. With the minimal amount of understanding between those three, I don't expect much. First start for Fontas? If our front three are brilliant, we might win 1-0. Otherwise this very well might be a 0-0.
There's going to be a lot of hunger in that front line, though. Honestly, up against an opponent that is struggling as much as Orlando are, I almost like our chances with Croizet / Nemeth / Gerso more than Russell / Rubio / Salloi.
Maybe, but Orlando can score. They've got a nice attack, and we know well that Dom can do some damage. This is a time when we have to step up. Orlando score more than 1.5 per game, but give up almost 2.5. We need to score and I think it's possible. Gerso's pace will trouble them, based on what we've seen from them this season. Nemeth has had almost a month to get in sync, and as noted, he will be hungry to show this should be his spot. Croizet has a goal in him, and this is supposed to be his spot on the field. If we don't win this one, I don't see us grabbing a top two spot (not because the math works against us but because this is the sort of game a top team has to win). Salloi needed a bit of time away. he won't be getting any rest, but at his age maybe just the ego boost will be more important.
Seriously, Ramos needs to be slapped for this one. He's bringing in players who might play in MLS or USL games to take part in the US U-20 and U-19 invitational, which pits those two sides against Jamaica and Venezuela? WTF? Aside from giving the Venezuelan players a chance to escape a collapsing economy, I can't see much point in this mini-tourney. Of course, I admit I can never see any point to U-nats games for professionals (they get better comp week in, week out).
Yeah, ultimately a little disappointing we weren't able to get that second goal, but considering all the absences, good to get the win and move on to the next one. One thing I was reminded of though - Nemeth has a wickedly quick shot. He can redirect a pass on goal with speedy reflexes faster than anyone else on the team.
i really hope the team gives gerso a hard time in the locker and on the practice pitch about his right foot. i've complained on here numerous times about that one time where he went around the ball just so he could pass it with the outside of his left. that's still the worst i've ever seen from a professional player... but that shot tonight is a damn close second. he should be embarrassed. honestly.
If Dwyer had beaten Melia I think we'd feel quite different. But he didn't, and I feel good. I knew that I would. Now, about the stats A couple general thoughts. We put in 27 crosses and converted on 4. They put in 5 and converted on 2. Audi stats: Our overall score (4896) is on the edge of an elite Audi performance in MLS. The fact that we had 10 players at our above the average range would back that up. The fact that they also had 8 players above that line might detract, and their score of 3366 is more often what you end up with in a tie, and sometimes in a win. The numbers say it was a very high quality game. What I could see on Eurosport (not much, grrrr, 45 minutes) made it look that way. Our best player, per Audi, was Croizet, with an overall 749, quite a nice number. He had one of our complete crosses, and 7 of our misses. He completed 42 passes in the attack, and missed on 10. It's interesting to me that he had four passes, total, in the defensive half. But he also won 4 corners, 3 takes and 2 tackles. In addition to the assist and a SOG, he had one off goal, and two key passes (passes that led to shots, so would be assists if people had scored). Beyond Audi, it's interesting to go the game box score and isolate our three up top for this game. Croizet was all over the attacking right. Gerso was all over the attacking left. Nemeth was up and down the central zone. There wasn't much overlap (there was some, more with Croizet and Nemeth as Nemeth shaded right on top of the box). This is, uhm, interesting. Is it good? Thoughts? Our next highest Audi numbers, from Felipe, 655, and Ilie, 508. Felipe connected on 70 passes, missed on 10, all in the attacking half. Ilie connected on 88 passes and missed on 7, two in the defensive half. Ilie won four headers, which is nice. As noted, everyone was good, but Fontas is worth noting. 74 completed passes, 3 off target. won 2 headers and made 2 ints. A very controlled game. What I saw looked good, the numbers back that up. Nemeth's numbers are good, but one interesting point. He had one take on with the dribble, and lost it. It was right next to the 6 on the right. He looked good, professional, 2 SOG and 2 off G. But where's the swagger? His mojo is missing.
I’ve had a little time to digest what happened Saturday night. I’m still scratching my head over why SKC can’t seem to get their act together in the final 3rd, even against a really bad team like Orlando. Yes, we like the win, but it only happened because Dwyer couldn’t finish or Melia made a great save (which ever way you want to look at it). I don’t know why PV wanted Gerso to play on the left side. If he was going to put Croizet on the wing, I think he would have worked better on the left and put Gerso on the right. Gerso has the more potent shot off his left foot cutting in from the right and I believe that would have made a difference in both shots and crosses. Croizet has a better right foot than Gerso and could have done better on the left cutting into the middle of the field. I have to hand it to Croizet because he worked his butt off during the game. He was all over the place and never gave up on any play. But, the one thing the game did show is that his talents are not best used on the wing. I like him a lot better in the midfield. I also have to give Fontas a lot of credit by coming in and doing a real good job replacing Ike. Fontas is very cool on the ball, made good passes and manhandled Dwyer when he needed to. So far, he looks like a great acquisition.
I mean, we were without three starting forwards, and Opara is one of our better marks on set pieces. I dunno, I feel like people are quick to forget that we've scored 49 goals this season and have a +16 goal differential. The offense hasn't really been a problem this season. Even in that poor stretch we had in July, we still scored eight goals in five games.
All season folks have essentially said, "I don't like the way we score goals". Which is utterly ridiculous. It's pretty simple to me, the offense has been altered, most of the year, to where our supporting cast are the goalscorers as opposed to our #9. I mean it makes sense why it's been productive. Is it easier to mark 1 goalscorer or 4/5 guys popping up into that central space? We've had 6 years of proof that the prior doesn't work. Do the research, I have. It's absolutely wonderful that Diego Rubio is scoring goals, but the production from the rest of the team has significantly declined. Lets break it down. I took the goal stats of the wingers, attacking mids, and Zusi (who is basically a winger) and pinpointed their production to who was on the field at the CF Spot. Here's the results Shelton: 1158 minutes played. 1 goal every 48.25 minutes from supporting cast -Russell- 5 Goals -Salloi- 5 goals -Guttierez-4 goals -Zusi- 2 goals -Lobato-1 goal -Gerso-1 Goal -Yohan-1 Goal Rubio: 595 minutes played, 1 goal every 119 minutes from supporting cast -Yohan- 2 goals -Russell-1 goal -Gerso- 2 Goals Other: (Nemeth, Salloi, etc...) -Guttierez-2 goals -Lobato- 1 goal -Russell- 4 goals It's pretty simple to see why the supporting cast is not producing at the same levels when Rubio is on the field. Rubio thrives in the spot in between the opposing D mid and Centerback. Shelton thrives in spots way deeper in midfield, and the channels in space. This allows the supporting cast to fill that spot where Rubio is typically filling. There's simply no space for anyone to cut into. It's great that Rubio is scoring, but I'm worried about this come playoff time.
This feels like a cherry pick with selective data. You can’t just remove Rubio goals and call it a complete story. What is the total goals scored with the different CF on the field? What we have not seen is Rubio with Nemeth at wing. Nemeth did not look good or sufficiently involved against Orlando. He might simply be a winger in this system. If he does that better than Salloi, so be it.
i saw terrible cross after terrible cross in saturday's game. hard to get involved like that. he did, however, flub a good opportunity in the first half which he definitely should've done better with. i'd like to see a full game with russell on the wing (we've already seen them combo for a goal in limited time) instead of the helter skelter of croizet.
My opinion is that Gerso is still not that good. He provides a spark coming off the bench, but I get frustrated watching him lose the ball repeatedly by dribbling into traffic and not having any idea when or where to pass the ball. I have no preference between Rubio, Nemeth, and Shelton at CF; it depends on the opponent, the gameplan, home or away, etc. They each have their strengths. And the fact that SKC has three CFs, and I am happy with all of them, is the most amazing thing in the world to me. On the wings, Russell is a given. The other one can be either Salloi or Croizet depending on form. I do not think Gerso should be starting when everyone is available.
His point wasn't to discount the Rubio goals, his point was that when Rubio's on as CF he's been more of THE guy and the rest of the team hasn't scored as many. Shelton meanwhile hasn't shown to be THE guy at CF but that the rest of the team has scored more around him.
There is an interesting give and take here, though. Goals scored are NOT independent of one another. If we are up 2-0 in the 90th minute, we're not bombing down the field in a desperate attempt to score a goal. That means that if our goals are coming from one source (say, our CF), the direct effect is we're not going to see as many goals come from another source (say, our supporting cast). So yes, it makes sense that the supporting cast scores a lot more when Shelton is at CF than when Rubio is. And that's dgb09's point: there IS statistical bias here. Which means you can't just look at the numbers of the supporting cast alone and draw the conclusion that our supporting cast isn't pulling their weight anymore (which is Sparks27's concern).
Sure, and that deserves benefit of the doubt. However, we all decried this team for months as our CF did not score goals. That our CF began scoring goals and we continued to dominate and win games should create celebration rather than consternation. Now, if the point here is that we don't trust Rubio to remain this incredible goal scoring machine, that makes sense. But until he dries up keep going, no point in preemptively ejecting from something that is working. And Nemeth may work in CF position. But the first full game there didn't look great. And I don't buy that Yohan was a problem. He was very active on the right and moving the ball into the center area. For whatever reason, Nemeth didn't capitalize. Perhaps more reps there make a difference for Nemeth. At this point in the season, we could all reasonably agree that Nemeth would be better than Gerso on the wing. If Nemeth also is better than Salloi on the left wing, do that. Put whoever is the best option at left with Rubio and Russell in their respective spots. Then we have legitimate options - holy crap, real options that aren't like Jake Peterson - to change up multiple spots in the attack based on a pre-game tactic for an opponent and/or in-game changes based on what's happening.
I'm not sure how much Shelton's presence meant to the supporting cast. If you look at the xG the supporting cast is generally underscoring. Croizet has 2 goals, would be expected to have 4.3. Zusi has 2, should be 2.76. Illie has 4 should be 5.6. Espinoza has 1, should be 2.83. Opara has 1, expected to be 2.66. Shelton himself is at 2, expected at 4.7, meaning it's kind of difficult to say anything about these guys because a hitting half the shots they should be. Meanwhile, Felipe has 6, expected to have 2.5, Medranda 3 expected .3, Russell 8 on 6.6, Salloi 7 on 6.5, and Rubio at 8 while expected 2.1 are overperforming. So more than half our goals are coming from people who are hitting shots that would not be expected to score, meaning they haven't exactly been in great positions, almost all of our goal differential is unexpected (14 of 16). It's wrong to say Shelton totally sucked. he clearly did not. He played parts of his role very well. But it's also wrong to give him too much credit. Others should have been scoring, both while he was there and while he was not. And some were scored while he was there (and when he was not) for reasons unrelated to his efforts. There are reasons Felipe scored while he was playing. Felipe actually was healthy and playing. Russell? We all worry he's running himself into the ground. He was fresher when Shelton was still healthy. Rubio wasn't getting Russell at his best or Felipe at his best. and recently Salloi has not been at his best, but that's also been a concern for a player who for the first time has been asked to shoulder such a heavy load for the attack. Giving Shelton full credit for the attack earlier this year is too simple. Edit to add: Also, funfact, Gerso is our only player dead on his xG, 3-3.01.