Ha! Yes, he could have done better, and it would have been even worse for us. I know better than to get into such arguments on social media though . . .
Have we seen an academy player go on to have success away from RSL outside of Salcedo? And in his case, you can't claim RSL wasn't willing to sign him because he was under contract and asked to be traded.
I'm actually so disillusioned with this team that I watched the Jazz game instead. One of the only times since 2008 that I've done that. Can someone talk me off this ledge and give me a reason to care about this team and its incompetent leadership?
Funny, I was thinking about creating a thread titled "Talk Me Off the Ledge"! Obviously, I've got nothing for ya. Honestly, I feel that the organization sent a message when they re-hired Waibel. The message being that they can't compete consistently with the big boys and that they're content being a mid-table team and pulling in a modest profit without the high risk high reward approach. Not sure watching this team brings me any joy and I'm close to Marie Kondo-ing the whole thing.
Wasn't it Dunny that tried saying the other player 'leaned' into the kick. It felt like madness. Would've made sense had the kick been at more of a normal level and the player was leaning or diving to try and make contact with the ball. That was clearly a very high kick. Not malicious, but an easy red. It seems like some of this latest crop might be going on to do great things. Time will tell of course, but not signing some of those players stings a bit, imo.
I think we all could use a little perspective on this early season. We got results in the first 2 games. That’s a positive thing. We got blown out yesterday, but the ejections had a lot to do with the scope of the loss. It has to be admitted that DCU has a much more talented roster than RSL, so a road result was unlikely at best. My main disappointment was in the continuation from last year of soft give-aways in our half of the pitch.
The only problem is the teams that spend a lot of money on stars are now also pumping a lot of money into academies. If RSL is going to compete, not only do they have to cross their fingers for a "golden generation," but also have to hope that European teams don't snatch their players. Unless the team's philosophy changes, it's going to be awhile before RSL is anything more than a mid-table team again.
I still think it's funny that Waibel said we had a lull in talent from the academy. I mean, what seems obvious to me is that he was publicly embarrassed by the exodus of talent from the academy and he's trying to CYA. But that seems like an odd way to do it.
I think you should start the thread "Talk Me Off the Ledge!" because I am also pretty disillusioned with this team. I will still go to games and watch because...car accident. It's what you do, right? At some point they get it cleaned up because it's just a fender bender but this looks like it could combust into a giant multi-car fire at any moment. I know it's early but I don't see much change from last season with this team. Put another way, this is not a "team". At the moment it's a collection of players and positions that don't seem to mesh well or seem to like playing together. I still think its 50/50 Petke makes it out of this season as the coach. They just rehired Waibel and if it all turns to car fire he's not the one out the door. I'm still sticking with my pre-season prediction that RSL will be lucky to get 10 points in the first 10 games. If they get 1 in the next 3 I will be amazed. I'm also counting on them to get annihilated a couple more times in the first 10. LAFC next week with call ups is going to be spectacularly bad and you can count on them dropping points to every expansion team. They only thing I really had to look forward to this season and they took that away too was confetti. I miss my confetti and watching the joy it brings my wife when she's chucking handfuls of that shredded joy. Help, help, I'm on a ledge!
Eh, we just lost to one of the best teams in the league. Y'all need to chill. Is this team filled with problems? It seems so, but I think we're still too early in 2019 to be completely be off our rockers. If we're a mess by the end of April/May are then, yes, this team should have some serious questions asked. But as of now, nah, let it be.
I help clean the dance studio that my daughter dances at to cover (the insane) cost of her dancing so I missed the first half of this one I had plans to come home and watch but my old man, helping us clean, said "ugh, we're down 2-0" on the way home so I was like... maybe not. I watched the first half in fast forward and agree that the first 15 ish were actually pretty good soccer from RSL. Whats still lacking is the final piece and I think part of that is this whole moving Rusnak to LW decision. Kreilach isn't a 10. He isn't a 9. He isn't an 8. I don't know what the hell he is. But it's killing the ability of this team to be decisive in the final third, IMO. I know a lot of talk through the first two games was how Everton makes KB look younger... I'm not into it. What Everton does is take focus off of KB. KB still has (plenty) of flaws. This game highlighted those. A talented midfield will go around Everton and still attack KB. We lucked out in the first two that the teams didn't want to put 2 and 3 players in that area. DC did. We paid for it Marcelo Silva had a howler of a game. He scored a 3.5 in whoscored. I've never seen a score that low. He was attrocious in multiple instances and the second yellow card was a fitting end to his night. I've seen people bitch that Silva didn't deserve his first yellow. I can see that. But his second yellow was a pretty clear DOGSCO and probably should have been straight red on its own. Speaking of red, that Savarino red is one of those weird non-malicious dangerous play scenarios. That Dunny wants to say that the DC player lowered his head into the kick is hilarious. Dunny, he's heading the ********ing ball. Thats how you head the ********ing ball. Jesus christ I watched the second half with my old man and I gotta say, I hope you guys don't have the same false sense of belief in this team that he does. He was livid with us giving up a 4th and 5th goal. At that point I was laughing. We deserved the ass whooping. I'm happy with it, honestly. Why? Because the tactics Petke employed in the second half were laughably bad for a team down a man. You could drive a truck down our midfield and not hit a player in white. Subbing off KB and Luiz was just flat out stupid. This was a perfect situation for Petke to show he's grown tactically and he failed. Look, I didn't expect us to keep them off the scoreboard after going down a man, and especially after going down two. But I expect Petke and the team to realize that GD is a thing in this league and that getting your shit kicked in like that is horrible for the psyche of the team. Yet... If you didn't applaud the 4th goal (like folks on twitter) then you're an asshole. That was a ridiculously good hit. Sure, he doesn't have as much pressure as he would in a normal game, but not many players can hit that at a training session with nobody around them. Applaud good soccer Herrera had a howler. To his credit, he owned it on twitter and has said he'll improve it. I'm curious what type of game he'll have at LA. This team has scored one goal in the run of play and it was from a good build up but honestly a bit lucky as Rusnak didn't mean to meg the Houston player. This is concerning. Like I said in the point tracker, this was an expected loss in a lot of ways. It sucks to get your shit kicked in, but moving on is key. A big test is waiting in LA I have no idea what the team will look like in LA but I can't wait to hear how the "deepest team in club history" can't play as well with all these players missing.
Where I'm at with Herrera is that I think he's good as long as he doesn't have to touch the ball. If we're asking him to tackle, or defend in space, he's good. He was really strong against Vancouver doing basically this. But he's so poor with his left foot. He can't receive or pass on the run because he has to cut back onto his right, so all of our attacks down the left are slow. He can't cross with his left at all. He can't clear with his left, so he always has to take a touch onto his right foot first and clear with his back to the sideline. DC clearly scouted Herrera well. Jara took the ball right off his foot for DC's second goal. He just played Herrera off the field. I really like Aaron and I think he could have a long MLS career, but this is such an obvious, glaring weakness. I just don't see how we can keep Herrera on the field unless he improves his left, or he beats out Brooks at RB.
Perhaps but I don't see this RSL team doing anything other than fighting to make the playoffs. This team hasn't improved to the level they were playing at the end of 2017. That team was dynamic and exciting. This RSL iteration is anything but dynamic and exciting. Supposedly it's a deep team and we shall certainly see next week with all of the call ups but the only thing that's deep about this team is the number of absolutely average players on the roster.
Three games in, lets talk stats We only logged 4 shots in the DC game, but of those, 2 were on target. Previous games had ratios of 14/5 and 18/6. We have not had a shot inside the 6 all season We had one shot in the box this game, previous games had 6 and 8. To have the ratios we did in terms of on target with those numbers is just flat out sad We haven't had a single fastbreak shot this year All 4 shots were with a right foot. Previous games were 13 in each. Vancouver game is the only game with a left footed shot (3) We had 43.3% of possession, which I was shocked by. Previous games were 46.5 & 50.7 Touches were actually higher than the HOU game. We had 584. 566 against Hou, 636 vs VAN Similarly, passes were middle of the three games (426) Hou: 376, VAN: 455 We only logged 8 "cross passes". Against HOU we had 20. Our tackle success rate (67%) was middle of the road 17 clearances was actually the lowest of the season (24 / 20) There wasn't a single offside called in the DC game, for either team We committed 11 turnovers, one less than both the HOU and VAN games (12 each) What is crazy is how these stats line up vs the other games and results. And especially player ratings. The average player rating for RSL was 5.71 while DC had an average of 7.55. Rooney got a perfect 10. Kreliach and Ruiz tied for best for RSL at 6.6
Orthogonal statements? Like 90 degrees out from each other? Maybe you mean 180 degrees opposite each other since I'm not sure what an orthogonal statement actually is.
Not disputing that. It could turn out to look awful a few years hence. I was responding to the specific assertion that we've not tried to sign academy players that have gone on to do great things. Yes, but he was terrible - although he was far from the only one along the Orlando backline. Amazed that they only gave up 3 goals in that game.