Eden Hazard has 13 for a very poorly coached and somewhat disinterested Chelsea team who didn't have a striker for much of the season.
I’ve never been a Zardes believer. It was clearly GB working his striker voodoo last year, like with Kei and Ola. Zardes is OK, a system striker, nothing more.
Agreed, our attack is anemic and creates far too few chances and capitalizes on those minimal chances at a less than ideal rate. I am not one that is ready to die on the expected goals hill, I do feel that those stats can be illuminating and help us to understand and quantify the game. As was mentioned by -content ignored- Gyasi is right in line on the season for goals v expected goals, in stats published before Saturday's game. Robinho is under-performing based on expected goals of 1.14. Pipa has 15 key passes, 2 assists on the season (from corners I believe) and an expected assists of 1.42 so he's over-performing expectations. Let that sink in. In 7 games (does not include this week's game) he's had 15 passes that lead to shots. From those, only 1.42 were expected to result in goals and we've managed to score twice. I will concede that for brief periods before conceding the first goal that we had a few good looks at goal. I don't think we dominated or were robbed. We could have converted one. The Pipa chip being least likely among them. We didn't score. It happens. But these types of things add up, as shown above, to a mounting pile of evidence that this team struggles to create good chances. If we don't finish with world class consistency, we're in trouble. I will also say that during that time when it was 0-0 I saw us playing long more than I have at any point this year. Not sure if it was a tactical wrinkle or just desperate hoofing to break pressure. It didn't work super well as we lost out on a lot of second balls. But it was a change. But I come back to this: I have no idea how this team plans to score goals. I don't have many ideas of how to fix it. I understand that we're in a unique situation as far as roster building due to the offseason uncertainty. But we kind of suck and it's as much the players as the coach.
How many strikers in MLS can thrive outside of "a system" designed to play to their strengths and hide their weaknesses? How many have the raw talent? Maybe 5? I'm asking cause I genuinely don't know. I mean even guys like Jozy have to have a system built to then. We are seeing Josef struggle in Atlanta this season. I mean, really this is a league of Dominic Oduro's and Kristian Nemeth's. I think Gyasi ends the season with somewhere between 10-15 goals. Not great, not MLS best 11 quality. But about the kind of season you'd expect from a starting striker on a team destined for mid table mediocrity and anonymity.
As someone else has observed, we just have to accept that this team is going nowhere this season. The odds of the Crew winning MLS Cup are roughly the same as the odds of Gal Godot showing up at my front door begging for a chest massage. This year is a gimme. The team was saved, Keith Naas is still taking victory laps and we're just waiting for someone to build us a soccer team. Beyond that, theres really nothing to argue about.
I can't tell you an exact number, but I feel pretty confident saying that until the Crew organization gets settled and turns toward spending significant money on players we won't see a player like that taking the field for the yellow-clad Black and Gold (or turquoise if the league's patting itself on the back that week).
Yes, I did watch the game. All the way until they scored the third one. I'm not in the Pipa is God or Pipa should be gone camps. Like you said, you can't get assists if the teammates don't score; and vice versa. So far this season it's been a good mix of both. The last pass is lacking most of the time and, when it does come through, the guy receiving the pass botches the chance or the keeper makes a good save.
But I disagree that we pass effectively. Our passes rarely beat a player or a line. Most do not accomplish any positional or tactical improvement. The ball doesnt move quickly either so you’re not tiring the other team who can comfortably shift their two rows of 4 to either side without expending energy or losing their shape.
You may rightfully argue we aren't effective passing in final 3rd. But maintaining possession is effective tactics (anywhere on the field). Simple notion that if the other team doesn't have ball they can't score. Of course we also don't win if we don't score. We are winning time of possession and the volume of passes suggests we are probably moving ball fairly quickly. I actually thought up to the shit goals by Timbers we were tiring them out. Then with 2 goal lead the packed it in. Missing Afful has been evident in that our fullbacks aren't getting forward enough to unbalance the defense. Waylon does occasionally but then seems to be a liability getting back to defend.
Most good teams would be having challenges if they lost both their starting wingbacks--as happened to us--especially in MLS where depth is simply not going to be there due to finances for most teams.
Wait, I thought Pipa and Porter were the problems? Stop with this thoughtful analysis! [emoji23][emoji23]
Agree on that one positive of our possession, and I meant to mention that. But also our mentality seems to be possess to not lose rather than possess to win. As for speed of our ball movement, I judge it by whether or not we disrupt the organization of the other team. Mostly we do not. On a separate note, I was very disappointed with Artur on the 2nd goal. Trap left Ebobisse to apply pressure to the ball. He looked over his shoulder to confirm that Artur was there to pick him up. Artur was either ball watching or just had terrible reaction to Ebobisse's darting run into the box. Not sure if it was bad communication or what, but Artur can't let that happen. Or I guess, Trapp can't leave Ebobisse to put 3 on the ball unless he is 100% sure that someone is going to pick him up. Trapp never actually got to the ball to apply pressure, so his leaving Ebobisse was not a good decision either.