wow.... pulled that one out...lucky deflection ... I think Howard had it if no deflection I thought Niemeth looked good and the team was better with him on. Two weeks off.... the big question is can our $500K player get in shape enough to make the bench in that amount of time? lol
We win, we win!!! Got a little lucky on that one. What bothered me the most was Paul saying several times, the teams were even, steven; could go either way. Colorado is one of the worst teams in the league, what's that make us?? Again Bunbury goes 90 mins, wtf! When Nemeth came on I thought good replace Teal, nope Rowe. Here comes Juan, now Teal will be replaced; nope Penilla. I like Teal as a 75 min sub to run against tired legs, but to play the full game, nfw. The only thing I can think of that Brad likes about Teal is his willingness to play defense. I like my forwards to play defense, but as their secondary purpose. Their primary purpose is to score goals!
Some encouraging points: Some defensive depth in evidence. Zahibo settling in. Penilla making impact. Some work in progress: Attack is occasionally sharp, but mostly sputtering.
That was some seriously unattractive football yesterday, from both teams. Turner was MOTM. The Fort was good yesterday, but I kept looking around the stadium and thinking how sad a spectacle it was. If the Revs had a team president who cared, you'd think a crowd that sparse and disconnected would be a glaring problem in need of fixing.
And yet the one goal was on him. His decision to come out for it was the wrong one. But if the point is nobody else distinguished himself much, I'd agree. There just wasn't much good soccer being played by either team. Leaving aside Somi, I'm underwhelmed by our additions. Zahibo has been okay, but certainly no better than Koffie. Penilla got a cheap assist yesterday, aided by poor defending, but otherwise hasn't shown me much. I thought a few weeks ago this team was slightly better than last year's prize-winning edition, but now I have my doubts. And I'm at a loss to know why Nemeth isn't starting.
Penilla tried a move out on the left wing in the 1st half where he forgot to bring the ball with him and the Rapids defender collected the gift. Don't know that I've ever seen anything quite like it. Penilla seems real spotty: a few moments of quality mixed with a lot of clumsy play.
A win is a win is a win. Anyway you look at it they got the w. Wasn't always pretty but they got it done. Kudos to Tierney who came in and played well. couple things of note Bunbury still has a terrible and has no business being a starter. I really like watching rowe, fagundez and nemeth out there together. Turner had a few exciting moments he also made a couple questionable choices but he still a young goalkeeper and we saw that with Cropper last year.. time to get ready for next week
Well the revs kept 11 guys on the field - that's a win by itself, the 3 pts was a bonus. I'm most excited by Penilla and the just-signed Colombian of the new guys. Penilla's assist was a good heads up play and finished well. That type of creativity and movement is something that's been lacking in the revs attack. Speaking of the attack...ok I'll say it, we don't need Lee Nguyen. Time to move on and get some TAM/GAM. While the attack wasnt super sharp, I'm reasonably convinced if Nemeth starts and Teal comes on as an attack sub where he can use his speed, the attack will flourish. That's one tactic I agreed with Heaps on.
Rowe-Fagundez-Penilla-Nemeth play well off each other; that should be the starting 4 on offense. (New Colombian TBD). If all goes well, i think Caldwell is sacrificed and Rowe becomes a deep lying play-maker. Then we may have actually fielded a mid-table offense. Penilla & Bye: Decent games with modest growth I like these 2 additions so far. Bunbury - Second coming of Khano Smith. All speed/hustle, no results. Bench at best; cut if I had a say. Caldwell - Had a sub-par game compared to the past, a lot of sloppy passes. Farrell & Anibaba did well against a poor offense in it's first game of the season. They were exposed by Jackson's speed when he came on. Turner - Good game, based on raw skill, the goal was fully on his decision making. As someone pointed out after the first game, he likes to play out of the back, but in several instances he rushed the distribution and gave it to someone who was under immediate pressure leading to them booting the ball up field. Tierney - Nice goal, unclear if it was going in without deflection. He and Caldwell seem to ooze class and professionalism, but I don't want him on the field, where his lack of speed is a liability. Nguyen & Agudelo - Time to move on. Nguyen slows down the offense spinning in place. Agudelo is too unpredictable. Time to start developing the youth.
My take on Penilla is that he's mostly fast. I see him and DIego splitting time in that position when BF finally gets Lee on the field. I like the idea of Penilla running at a tired defense after Diego runs out of gas I also don't understand Nemeth not starting. We were clearly better with him up top than Teal and I certainly don't understand what they're doing to Lee. With a bye week, BF can't possibly say there is a conditioning issue anymore.
Conditioning was always a BS excuse. Nguyen doesn't want to be here so he's not being given any minutes. It's the equivalent of sending an malcontent first team player to train with the reserves in Europe.
I know it was windy so I'll save concrete judgements, but Penilla's crossing and shooting were horrible. He was fast and made good runs, but it seemed like he never made solid contact with the ball when shooting or passing. His assist was fine. Perhaps he was nervy in his first home start, and that expressed itself on that final shot or pass. Farrell played a good game at CB, although he got a little dribble happy at times, which left him out of position. I wouldn't mind trying him in a defensive midfield role. The foul on Somi should have been a straight red. Not sure how that was missed, the foul was right in front of the assistant. I think Turner's one fault so far has been his reluctance to come off of his line quick enough. The Colorado goal was a nice cross and finish, but I think Turner could have punched it away if he had anticipated the play better. That sort of instinct comes with time. His close range shot stopping is awesome.
I think there's a lot of sitting on hands. Two possible reasons. We sucked last year. I think there's a lot of wait and see as to how we'll play. It was cold.
But he is here and we're paying him 500K so I think it's time to for him to get over where he want's to be and to start earning his pay. If he has any hope of moving, the best thing for him to do is to get out there and show what he has to offer, then maybe teams would be interested. This approach will do nothing but convince teams hes trouble and they'll stay away. Maybe he's forgotten that we picked him up off the MLS garbage pile and gave him an opportunity to restart his career. All I know is I've watched this team from the beginning and for the last 5 years or so, Lee's been the only real reason to watch. The Revs without him are not very good. I watched Atlanta yesterday.... OMG they'll tear us apart. Fast and good...totally better than us. The right thing for BF to do would be to try and convince Lee that this is the right place for him. Get him on the field.... let the juices start flowing again. I do not believe he would not try if out there. No real player would do that. Putting him in a "time out" will not help the Revs at all. We will start losing very soon and BF better be ready for it. We played two soft teams so far and are very lucky not to be sitting on 1 point right now. Getting Lee on the field can only help our pathetic attack and from his prospective, increase his value
Theyre not freezing their asses off and have a team to cheer for. We have neither a warm stadium (we do have crappy turf though), or a good team
The good: - Three points! - Turner made some nice saves, including the PK - Rookie Bye acquitted himself well - No red cards - Nemeth got on the field The bad: - Somi injury - Only 2 SOG The ugly: - Tim Howard faced only 2 shots, zero saves. One went through his legs, the other he gave up on after it was slightly deflected. Further proof he is past his prime. - Price gets the rebound of his PK with an empty net in front of him, only to put it over the bar. - Nguyen still not in the 18 Nguyen held out for two weeks, so maybe Friedel planned to "hold him out" of the 18 for two weeks as retaliation. Otherwise, I don't think we will ever see Lee in a Revs kit again.
One a PK Kai didnt really fit with our team last year. A target forward that was often seen outside, trying to bring the ball up. Didnt work This year, I have no idea what our team is so far, Some good pieces that don't really fit together yet. Like a French friend once said to me about our company...."Is there a pilot for this plane"? That's what I feel right now about the Revs
I think he just needs a little more confidence which should come with playing time. On that goal his first reaction was good. He started off his line but then stopped and had to restart his attack of the ball. If he had trusted his first instinct he would have been there first. Great save on hte PK and lucky that the rebound was skyed. Some thoughts on the others: Bye looked ok but did nothing special Farrell and Anibaba were good. Anibaba's communication was really good. He took control and did a good job organizing the back line. Somi - Unfortunately we didn't get to see much. Tierney - Good free kick but if it had not been deflected it would have missed the net. Other than that, he got the job done. Zahibo - I don't recall seeing him ever move quickly. He seemed to cruise around the field. I'm hoping he has more to give in the future. Caldwell - had a rough start passing at the start of the game for the second week in a row but as the game went on he seemed to be everywhere. I thought he played well and I like seeing the arm band on his arm. Rowe - Don't understand taking him out while Bunbury is still on the field. I would really like to see him playing where Fagundez has been playing. Penilla - Looks lost in close quarters but the one time he was able to run at the defend in the open field resulted in a goal. I hope we see more of that. Bunbury - Maybe Brad has fallen for the Bunbury hustle trap. He sees him work hard in training and rewards that with playing time. Hopefully he will learn that Teal can not hit the net. Nemeth - I want to see him more and preferably paired with Juan up top. I think they could play well off of each other. Agudelo - Didn't see much in the short time he played.