Silva came on and immediately disappeared. Buuuuut, since the guy he replaced had all but disappeared at first kick it didn't matter.
HUH??? He might not have been as bad as he was in earlier games, but he still passed to the other team several times and was ball watching like everyone else at other key moments.The best that I will say for him is that he was not good.
That's the bar he had to jump. But yeah, he really didn't look good by any means. Not many players in an RSL kit did.
I've been saying it, but more nicely, for 18 months. In the end I admitted Cassar wasn't ready for the HC job. But Waibel did him no favors with the roster he provided.
...and the constant "Injuries are the biggest problem facing this team. More than any other team in MLS." He did go on to say in a more muted way that the team isn't playing well and that key players "have not peaked".
to Pattys point, though, our offense is healthy. Yura hasn't missed a game. Plata is back. Rusnak hasn't missed a game. Lennon is better than Jordan Allen. The offense isn't there. It would be one thing if we went out there and lost games 3-2. Instead we're losing 3-0 after a 3-1 home defeat. We've scored more than one goal in a game three times this year. The first time in the humiliating loss at Minnesota (4-2), the second time in the snow game, the third in the god awful win at the cRapids. So, when we're playing actual MLS level teams? We can't score. Cool. But yeah, injuries
The missed passes were not often forward where he was in a position to provide defensive cover, but square balls which left the defense completely open for the counterattack. That's deadly.
I used to look forward to Dunny's commentary, but this year he has been way too much of a company shill. Don't care about your twitter, don't care about Petke's sweater, and I certainly am tired of the excuses.
He's become far too much enamored with characters (the Super Troopers thing stopped being funny during the Atlanta game...) and is still convinced this is the deepest team ever, they just can't stay healthy*. *Never mind that injuries are what prove your depth
It may very well be the deepest team ever, the problem is that they are all nothing but depth. I find myself watching other teams play and thinking "what RSL players would be starting for this team?", truthfully I struggle to answer that question outside Rusnak and Lennon. RSL, as constructed, is a team with nothing but bench players outside the top 2-3 guys. That's why the results haven't changed with all the injuries, they weren't good to begin with. Too many of our key players are too old and past it or are not up to the league's new standard of starter material. When we say the league has become better it really does mean that most teams have greatly improved the front third or half of their roster, while RSL has spent all its time and money improving the back third or half of its roster. Now we're seeing the results of that, a team that doesn't drop off when the starting lineup is all hurt, but is still not competitive because that starting XI just wasn't that good to begin with.
I will have to disagree. 1. Phillips is/was on the Jamaican national team. He isn't garbage. He could start on many teams 2. Beltran is an MLS starter 3. Rimando for the last 10 years is a starter, although admittedly his current run of form is an outlier 4. Glad is a starter. As for the rest, we have some potential in Saucedo I Would say 6 total, 5 outfield, which is half the team, with maybe a 6th in saucedo. But there is a gaping hole in the midfield....
The quality Beltran displays is purely as a defender, he offers literally nothing else and is completely a black hole outside the defensive third. Even his defending has been suspect the start of this year and last year, but part of me is inclined to believe that is due to the overall horrible team and defensive play. Phillips is mediocre, ok defender, ok in the attack, he is your run of the mill MLS outside back and nothing more. He doesn't do anything great and could be displaced by someone like Acosta, IMO, if Beltran were healthy. Of course Rimando is a starter, but that's not a hard thing to find in US keepers. Glad I'd a starter purely because everyone else is hurt or garbage. He's a talent, for sure, and should be getting as many minutes as possible, but I think if teams had two proven starters he'd struggle to break in. He still makes a lot of youthful mistakes and will learn. Based on what I've seen from all the other teams in this league, our starter quality represents our current position in the standings perfectly. Even with a fully healthy roster we're a bottom third of the league type of team.
Phillips is a hard one. I think he could start on quite a few teams, but not all. But the point remains that he is MLS quality. I agree with UP on Beltran. If the team wants its defenders to defend then he'd start anywhere (and be a defender of the year type player). The problem is we don't want that from our defenders. Also, what the hell is up with his back? Rimando would start at every other MLS club. No doubt in my mind Glad would start, too. No argument there. We don't have difference makers. We have good rotation and depth players across the whole roster. Plata is supposed to be a difference maker. He's not. Yura is supposed to be one, he's not. Lennon is one, but disappears. Same with Rusnak. We have a lot of holes in our best XI, even when healthy. That's not good enough
This, I agree with. We have some MLS starter quality guys. I think we just don't have the right ones for our style and in some cases guys have taken a big step backwards this season. (Sunny, Beckerman, Rimando) I would argue Rimando, Phillips, Beltran, Glad, Beckerman, Sunny, Rusnak, Plata, Lennon and Movsysian are MLS starters when they play as they should in a system they belong in. Maund and Saucedo aren't far off either. Beltran and Movsysian don't belong. Rimando, Beckerman, Sunny and Plata need to figure themselves out quickly. And trade our current backup "striker."
At least people are still passionate enough to complain. The real concern will be when people stop complaining and stop showing up to games or even watching them entirely. Will those people eventually come back if the team starts to perform better, or will they just move on to something else?
I agree completely with this. It seems that while we haven't even been a team with star power in our good years we had players who were difference makers (Sabo, Javi, Beckerman, Olave). Along with that I think our role players were slightly better than role players on other teams (Johnson, Gabavoy, Espindola). Right now we have inconsistent difference makers (Rusnak, Lennon, Plata, Yura) and sub par role players (Beckerman, Sunny, Mulholland, Every CB not name Justen).
I think one of the biggest things I have noticed is that our vets are not demonstrating leadership. Part of that is due to injury, part of that is that they were here when everyone knew their role and they didn't need to tell others what to do. But we now have introduced several younger players that show great promise, but are too young (and thus timid) to be leaders at this level and need to be shown how to do so. It isn't by cynical tackles from behind or yelling when things don't go your way. It is by hustling, covering up for others mistakes, coaching on the field, basically preparing as a pro and passing the torch to the next guys. Look at the Jazz this year by introducing vets to a young core. Diaw, Hill and Joe Johnson showed the younger talent how you go out and prepare and compete every night. And the team grew as a result. Veteran leadership unlocked some raw potential. I am not seeing that from Nicky, KB or Yura during games (obviously I am not out on the practice field, so I can't comment there). Someone needs to have a heart to heart with these three and let them know the leadership required of them. Otherwise, we will waste the development of the new young core and spend another season going nowhere.
Out of curiosity, who used to provide this veteran leadership? If you've already removed Morales, Beckerman, and Rimando from the equation, who's left? Borchers? On a related note, who could be brought in to provide leadership? Was that maybe a thought process that brought Olave and Wingert back to the team in the past and it just hasn't yielded the desired results?
In reality, Boarchers was likely part of it. But I think a ton of leadership came from Kries himself. Once he left, the void was created. He was a big vocal personality on the sideline. When Cassar was the opposite, nobody filled the new hole.
I believe it was Will Johnson who told the story about Nat Borchers that, to me, really talked about the leadership of the team. Will, like everyone else who's ever been part of RSL in the past 10 years, said that on the pitch KB is the leader. He brings an intensity to the training pitch that few others do. Off the pitch, though, it seems to be different. Will talked about when he first joined the team and how he was received. He said all of the guys were receptive, but Borchers went out of his way to make sure all was well. Borchers even lined up dinner with Will to make sure things, on the personal side, were being looked after. That's a leader. Most any professional can (and should) show up to training with a high level of intensity. Once practice or the game is over, though, another form of leadership emerges. Those guys that realize this sport/profession is more than the 1.5 hours they put in on the pitch. Long story short, I think we lost that with Borchers and it shows in a lot of things. Discipline, for one, has never been great. We average just short of 14 fouls a game. That's not a good number at all. Petke seems like the kind of guy who will address this and hopefully correct it and/or get the right players to do so. Fingers crossed
I haven't really watched them since the 90s. I'll be honest though, I've checked out a couple of the playoff games so far. They do seem fun to watch now. For myself though, it's been almost 20 years since I've even cared to watch a game. Will there be more people like me that just disappear for that long if RSL keeps playing this way? I will say that I'm much more into soccer and hockey than I am with football and basketball. In the first two sports, I'd be more likely to bounce back faster than I would with the second two. It's still a segment of fans that could hurt to lose if nobody is filling in the void.