Baueris listed as a centerback, but Harvey had some quotes in the press about her as a DM/HM. In fact, in the small handful of appearances she had last year, most were as DM. I thought she really shined as DM, so i asked her which she preferred. Much to my surprise she got very very detailed and went on for a while, but yes she made it sound like HM is a position she is learning and made the comment of the vision required (in short CB she said is all forward, HM is 360).
Barnes, Naho, Utsugi, Taylor, Yanez, WESTPHAL, unsure, NEILSEN, MCNABB, Spencer. Speculating that the unsure might be Jacyie Johnson, anyone confirm? It is NOT Oyster.
ReignMan my have better predictions based on what he's seen in preseason but I'd imagine when Naho and Utsugi go that Andrews will plug in at AM and Long/Fishlock would move to DM. That's what I would want to see, but sounds like Bauer is training at HM as well. As for Naho's fill in my guess would be Spencer or Dallstream if she's had a good preseason. Perhaps Yanez? Might have differ to others there. I wish we had attacking options like we do defenders.
I didn't realize that. Good to know. That's certainly makes her more valuable. Sounds like she's very cerebral too which I appreciate and I know Vlatko does.
These are my thoughts as well. Dallstream and Spencer have the pace to play in the wing, Yanez does not. One person I’m curious about is Addo and what her preferred position is in the midfield.
Yeah that makes sense about the practice squad. I was hoping with the new rules players would be signed in Catley and WILLIAMS absence for the weekend. And a couple more when Naho and Utsugi depart. Wishful thinking on my park I suppose.
The obvious exception is Adelaide Gay, who is in that pool, but will be listed as goalkeeper replacement each match until Lydia gets back. A 5'5 goalkeeper! I'm looking forward to this because i'm expecting her to have a Jordanesque vertical leap.
I'm nowhere near ready to make predictions, especially since we were missing a lot of starters in pre-season. I look forward to starting lineups on Saturday. I can't wait to sit in my seats at Memorial for the 5th year. I can offer a few observations. Yanez is actually a very good #10. She said that's where she played before turning pro. Kobe moved her to forward. I don't expect see her on the front line this year but she made a HUGE statement in the pre-season about her value in center midfield. Andrews was so dynamic and overpowering in pre-season i can't see her being left off the sheet much -- hard to believe she is the youngest player on the team. I will predict Betos & Pinoe will start. Can't go further.
Goebel-Yanez (that's the name she used at the time) had been signed for Kobe after Sky Blue FC had made a tour in Japan in early 2013 and had met Leonessa in a double-header friendly match. At the time, INAC Kobe Leonessa had an heck of a midfield (including Sawa, Kawasumi, Ji So-Yun...), but missed a strong central forward, apart from Ohno, who was anyway the quick and nimble type, and quite wasteful to boot. So, when they noticed Goebel-Yanez's height (a double-value asset in Japanese League, where the average player is much much shorter then in NWSL), they nicknamed her "Giraffe" and decided she was going to be the central striker. For all the time she was in Japan, Bev wrote a very insightful blog for Pitchside Report, called "Beverly Goebel goes Global" (actually she had started it when she was playing in other countries, probably Finland, at the time when one of USA leagues had folded) and I remember one of her entries when she described her strange feelings on the pitch and the necessity to adjust to her new role: for instance, she had quite never took PKs and she frankly hated them, but in her debut-match in Nadeshiko League she was offered by her new team-mates to take not only one, but even two PKs, one per half! She scored both, INAC won that opening game of the season on her goals, and she ended not only winning the title with INAC, but even being the top-scorer of 2013 Nadeshiko League with 15 goals (If I remember correctly, Naho had finished just 2 or 3 goals short of her, at 12 or 13). You can read her sensations by yourself here.
Great Post! One of the things I recall from reading that blog was how much time her new INAC Kobe teammates spent with her after training to explain where every player on the pitch needed to be and what they should do and what she should do. Bev played for the WNY Flash in 2011, so I was a fan before her Japan experience. I was happily blown away when she lead INAC in scoring, and I was hugely pleased when she came back to the US to play for Seattle. Thanks for posting about Bev's blog and your memory of her play for INAC.
Yes, accurate team-organization (that's prepared outiside the pitch in training and continuosuly checked during games through constant shouting, talking and "chirping") is historically one of the strength of Nadeshiko Japan and of Japanese teams in general. Also, INAC players had a very lively social life outside the pitch, that always included the two "Americans" (beyond Goebel, INAC had also signed her former team-mate Becca Moros), who were never left alone with their potential "cultural shock" about Japan, but were instead involved in all sort of activities that quite always managed to thrill the new recruits about Japanese culture. Goebel in particular was sharing an apartment in Kobe with Naho and former NT member Asuna Tanaka and formed very solid bonds with her Japanese team-mates (if Reign Man will happen to talk again with her, he could remind her of the wedding celebration club and team-mates organized for her in Japan: I guess Bev still remembers it very well). I guess Naho feels so comfortable in Seattle also because she found a team-organization and a "family-like" environment not unlike those she was used to in INAC: she's basically experiencing on the other side of the Ocean something very similar to what Bev had enjoyed in Japan.
Probably you all know by now, but today NWSL website has updated the injury report for the first time in this season. Seattle Reign's one reads as follows: OUT: Yael Averbuch (illness), Kristen McNabb (right knee sprain), Kiersten Dallstream (right hamstring strain) QUESTIONABLE: None INTERNATIONAL DUTY: Steph Catley (AUS), Lydia Williams (AUS) So I guess most of our doubts about starting line-up predictions are now solved: Averbuch and Dallstream will be unavailable and this most probably leaves us with Bauer, and with Spencer for the Naho-less matches.
My projected starting line-up is Betos Barnes, Oyster, Bauer, Nielsen Utsugi Rapinoe, Long, Fishlock, Kawasumi Taylor
Yes they have both spoken of the reversing of the hospitality. When Naho came here in 2014 the club hired a translator for her, but very quickly realized they were not needed, because Bev translated for her. Up until last year, even on the autograph line, Bev would translate. This year Naho has gained comfort with her English (which was always better than passable) and i haven't seen Bev translating.
That statement was really as HUGE as Reign Man was describing it, and we should have better listened to him! So Yanez was in the center midfield yesterday, Utsugi was at LB and no Bauer at all. Not sure how the things went wih this line-up, because I just watched highlights, not the whole game (it was in the middle of the night for me in Europe, 3:00 or 4:00 am ; maybe later I could anyway watch a part of it if you guys tell me it's worth), but anyway we start with a win, that's always a good thing (season openers are tricky because each team wants to kick things, literally, on the right foot). If I got it right, from comments on the general Week 1 thread, we had a very convincing first half, that could have see us ahead by even more than just 2-0, and a so-so 2nd half, where we risked being caught by Washington. What's our real face? I remind everyone of you that we're the team that was able to waste 4-0 and 3-0 leads vs Sky Blue last season! I don't want to see anything of the kind anymore: the team is vastly different, but old habits aren't easily changed. What uses to happen to us mentally when we have a good lead? Do we get afraid? Do we get complacent? Anyway, I am happy that we have Betos in goal: she looked excellent to me from highlights: not showy, but always well-placed and she nearly even saved Lohman's goal, only managing to deflect it on the post though. While we wait for Williams to come back, it seems to me that we have a more than adequate replacement, who can give confidence to the defense as a whole.
I enjoyed watching this game. It was a fun back and forth match. Hard to pinpoint why Seattle weren't as dominant in 2nd. I think Lohman subbing in helped Washington a lot. But also I think the Spirit have strong players but just aren't working as a team consistently yet. Then the Reign were pressing very hard for a long time. They eventually just couldn't keep that pace.
Our long tradition of Player of the Week awards, remounting back to Kim Little's old times, goes on as Megan Rapinoe is NWSL Player of the Week for Week 1.
So I was super busy this week so I didn't have time to write my post game analyst. Now it's too late now to post any coherent analysis so I'm just gonna highlight some of the thoughts I had. I'm a fan of defense (especially defensive midfielders and left backs) which is why Fishlock is in my top 3 list. I have a feeling I'm going to like Long on this team if she played like she did last game all season long. Some one above asked why we got over run in the second half. I don't think it was due to Lohman but rather our midfield. Even in the first hald we failed to control the midfield and in the second half it got more pronounced. We were defending too deep and couldn't control possession. It might be due to the fact that we don't have a true holding midfield who can control the tempo of the game. Fishlock and Long have very similar styles in that they are great disruptors and whenever they win possession will look to push forward. Rapinoe, Yanez and Kawasumi are also natural attacks who will also look to attack as a first instinct. Not that attacking is bad but sometimes it's good to just hold the ball and slow the tempo down. This is where we miss someone like Keelin Winters. As much as I liked Utsugi at left back instead of Barnes, I thought she struggled in this game. Now it's too early to draw any conclusion as this was the first game of the season and the Spirit front line is insanely fast. Likewise Kawasumi who had a quiet game. I'm not sure if it's her fault or the fact that we very rarely looked to attack from the right side probably due to Rapinoe going insane on the left. However this is something we should address as we now have two good crossers of the ball on that wing (Nielsen, Kawasumi). Spencer is fast. There were multiple times late in the game when she absolutely sprinted down the pitch to disrupt a Spirit fast break. That was a nice sight.
One thing I'm looking forward to this season is Chris H stats from each game. I'll try to post my analysis of each game before the stats are released and see if the numbers matches up to what I'm seeing. For lats week's game, the numbers pretty much confirms every thought I had. http://www.allwhitekit.com/?p=15639
https://thebold.com/seattle-reign-f...national-team-replacement-player-8eeaaa530862 I'm late on this but I was pleased to see KC kid Jaycie Johnson signed as a replacement player. She is known for being a speedy, gritty, goal scorer but has seen some training as an outside back for US youth national teams. I know she probably won't get actual playing time, but she could conceivably provide cover at both positions (Rumi/Naho) that were left. I'm guessing that's why she was signed over other (very good) practice players at Seattle.