How many goals would he have this evening if people laid the ball off to him? He was camped out alone on that left side so many times...he could have pitched a tent and built a fire. Yura's lost some weight, saavy goal, but that whiff....
Movsysian took off at top speed to the locker room after the game. Giving only a couple of guys a high five on the way out. His shushing celebration was weird too. Is this all his being upset at coming off the bench lately?
Disappointed with Savarino's accuracy lately. It's like he picked up the off-targetitis from everyone else.
Plus: three points. Minuses: at home, against the other candidate for worst in the league, and looking unimpressive. But it could've been much worse. RSL could've lost and showed itself as the undisputed worst team in the league.
So if the shushing celebration is a response to the fans, I'm all done with Yura. You don't act like a fluke goal where the ball literally rolls to your feet is a supreme piece of skill, whiff on a ball 5 minutes later and pretend like you have the high ground.
That and it's been how long since he scored again? 2 months? Please, get the ******** outta here Yura, don't tell anyone to be quiet after the shit performances you've turned in over the last 2 months and being quite literally gifted a goal. I mean hell, Shuttleworth literally pushed the ball to you and pretty much everyone else stopped playing because they thought the whistle blew. All I could do was roll my eyes at the goal celebration, and dunseth praising it made me want to puke.
A game in a battle of meh, I end up saying meh despite winning I won't allow this battle of the cellar to get my hopes up. Petke's post game made me think the shush was toward him or somebody in the FO.
I joke that it's like they're all having 'Nam flashbacks. I feel like each season the intro video gets worse. It's like they've handed the creative design to someone taking a film class who suddenly they think they know what makes a good video. The earlier ones did a much better job of pumping up the crowd for the game. There's a good 4 times off the top of my head where the shooter should've laid it off to Lennon for the easier shot. We're going to continue to struggle with scoring if everyone continues to be selfish. Yura can stfu. Don't act like being benched was anything other than your own fault. If he would've been scoring or at least getting consistent assists, he'd still be starting. And his goal was a fluke more than any real piece of skill. Even he was yelling for a handball before finally looking down to see the ball sitting at his feet. Happy he scored, but he still needs an attitude adjustment, and still needs to prove over a handful of games that he deserves to be the starter.
I think too much is being read into Yura's shushing. I took it as a gesture to Minnesota, like saying, "we may have taken tons of shots, but we finally put one in, and we're winning now." They had a lot of guys on their team that did a ton a crying, and I took it as more of a gesture to them. If it was to Petke, that's a dick move, but then again, Petke told him to play in a way that told him to "shut the you-know-what up." KB started rough, but he disrupted their whole midfield play and continued to look better as the night went on, other than the stupid yellow. He forced them to play as a front and back line, and they were relying on long balls. Glad looked great, Luke hustled and sacrificed his body like crazy, and it was fun to watch the passing and runs of Plata, Savarino, and Brooks. Shuttlesworth stood on his head and had 9 quality saves, particularly off Luke's rocket. They couldn't expect him to save that many goals and be distribution king too. There were a lot of positives tonight. Minnesota is not great, but we owned possession and had consistent attack after attack. The U-20s are back with great experience, and people are fighting for positions instead of being chosen based on "Well.... due to injuries and call-ups, let's put [this dude] in this lineup spot."
Yura's Shush celebration was definitely for Petke. On his interview Petke said he told Yura to go score a goal and then he could tell me to shut the bleep up on Monday.
...and keep doing the same thing. I'll gladly take last 20 minute of the game higher energy Yura over starter slow-jog Yura every time.
I don't take too much from this game. Beating the other worst team in MLS is barely faint praise. Let's see what happens in San Jose. I still have my paper bag out.
I just look at it as a positive result that will hopefully break the funk we're in. Hopefully we can finally reach a turning point and start looking better. If we played like we did last night all season, I'm positive our points total would've looked a lot different.
Wife offered a short staycation in Park City for the weekend. Old me would be like "oh no way, RSL is playing at home" but a combination of many things (work, especially) made me go the opposite way. From the reports and highlights, I'll say I'm happy with the focus of being a good home team. We could lose all of our road games the rest of the year and I'd be fine with it - well so long as they aren't 5-0 thrashings - so long as we actually perform at home. That's something that slipped away more and more over the past few years and needs to be found again. One game doesn't undo the previous three horrible disasters. An improved performance, regardless of result, in SJ would make me think we've actually started a change.
how many goals would have have had? Probably zero. How does a team take 29 shots but only put one in the net? Shuttleworth had a hell of a game, but come on.
To be fair, only 9 were on target, and we really did take far too many shots from outside the box, IMO. We still need to work on finishing, and actually making more of those shots be on target as well. Another thing that would've helped is doing what the Monarchs do, and laying it off to open teammates instead of taking the selfish shot. There was a good 4 times where Lennon was completely open and a short pass over to him would've led to a better opportunity.
This pretty much is the response to @Ismitje 's post above. This is how you get one goal in 29 shots. Honestly though, had Shuttleworth not been standing on his head we easily should have had 3 goals, even without his howler-like play that Yura put back. In the 58th Kyle killed an attack by taking a shot from 40 yards that was just awful. It looked like he was actually trying to chip the keeper ala Bradley vs Mexico. It was a bad idea and terribly executed. I thought, No wonder we can't score a goal. As far as Lennon being open and guys not passing him the ball, I saw a couple of reasons why: 1. He gets open on the other side of the field after the dribbler has already begun his penetration. The dribbler has attracted many defenders and is focused on creating a shot or finding someone nearby to pass to. He cannot see Lennon. In those cases I think Lennon would be better off closing in on the back post to pick up deflected shots. 2. Our guys aren't great medium distance passers under pressure. So, even if they saw Lennon, the pass to him normally is going to be without pace and inaccurate. He might be open when the pass begins, but he won't be when he receives it. However, I think them not even seeing him is the biggest reason.
I'd say a good 1 out of 10 passes we attempt to players moving into space are actually ahead of the player, properly leading him so he doesn't have to slow down or adjust his angle. This is (IMO) by far the biggest technical deficiency on display in MLS, there are very VERY few players capable of consistently playing well-weighted passes into space/through gaps for players to run onto without having to adjust their pace or angle. As it is right now there isn't a single RSL player capable of doing this at an above average consistency. If Plata receives the ball and is required to make a through pass you might as well forget any kind of positive flow (if not an outright turnover), he is among the worst on the team of making decent through passes to players making any kind of run. The vast majority of the time I see passes which result in the recipient having to either stop or even backtrack to collect the pass, it's infuriating watching so many forward movements by this team just completely die because of poor passes.
I could be wrong in my remembering, but a couple of those would've been passes of maybe 5 yards. Similar to the passes that the Monarchs are routinely pulling off when they're laying it off for the easier shot. One in particular, Plata was turning, clearly off balance, and just blasted a shot. Lennon would've been a simple pass to the left, and would've had a much cleaner attempt on goal. As far as the vision goes, yeah, sometimes there are other players in the way, but isn't part of being a good player knowing where your teammates are? It's not like your vision is obstructed all the time. These guys are supposed to be professionals. Are we really supposed to give them slack for not knowing where their nearby teammates are?