When we scored I smiled, and thought that at least we made a game of it. And I thought, gee it would be like RSL to give up a goal eventually. I send a text message to a friend, and look up, to see the dallas celebration of goal 2. I could only think, "Well. Thanks for not letting me get too hopeful!" and turned off the stream. Kreilach was a fool. Silvas touch is bad. Savarino's goal really pulled something out of nothing, but not in a good way. Let me explain. When my team scores, I ask how it was scored. Penalty kick is the worst way of getting something good of course, but a goal is a goal. Savarino's was also kind of depressing, because we didnt really do anything to generate a chance. Savarino took a good shot, but its not like we pulled that defense apart. We cant depend on sava to keep on finding gems out of nothing like that. Sava just found the barest seam. its hard to find that seam, and not a lot of goals come from efforts like that. I dunno guys. I am not happy. There was a time in 2012 and 2013 where we didnt have much offense, but I could count on a piece of magic from Javier Morales. He would put the team on his back, and he would find a way to get us a goal. Hed pull apart the defense, and create scary danger for the opposing team. Right now I feel like we dont have much offense, but no one has that magical touch. As others have mentioned, our defense is also shite. =(
I don't think those two should ever be paired together. They do take unnecessary risks and each of them need to be paired with a more conservative partner. In my mind, it's like Olave and Borchers. I keep wanting Glad to be that Borchers-like steady and conservative defender, but he consistently gets burned by playing too high and allowing balls played in behind him to catch him off guard. He also has more than his share of sloppy passing. Hopefully both aspects of his game continue to evolve. Have high hopes for Holt, but he bit hard towards the ball initially on the opening goal, allowing his man to run in behind him for the goal. IMO, young central defenders take more time to develop than just about any other position on the field. Likely to be awhile yet before we see the top form of Holt, and even Glad.
I sat through the entire game on Saturday and was not very impressed which should go without saying. On the first goal I actually burst out in laughter. My daughter asked me what I was laughing at and I just told her it was like watching the keystone cops out there on that play. Her reply was, "what are the keystone cops?" I was really hoping to see some grit and determination similar to what we saw last Saturday against LAFC, instead we were treated with a team that wasn't ready or capable to handle the speed of pressure and attack from FCD. The lack of speed on this RSL team was laid bare on the night. Not one of the attacking players for RSL could get away from the FCD players even with a head start. Sad. I was dismayed with the subs, as usual. Sucks for Holt, not much you can do if he's injured but hopefully it's not too serious. Knock on wood. With 10 men and needing some speed up top for counters to the pressure put on by FCD why do you wait 17 minutes to sub in Baird? I get you only had 2 with the Holt injury but come on. And waiting until the 80th minute or so to put in Johnson was simply a waste. I can kinda understand it, after the fact, considering he didn't get back in town until Friday but if he's you fastest player get him in the game. And why sub out Rusnak? Sub Sava, slide your better player to the wing and let him try and spring Johnson instead of counting on a player like Sava who isn't really prone to finding his team mates very often. And why on earth does this team need to hold on to the ball for at least 3 touches before they just pass the damn ball backwards? It's like the offense is 1 pass forward, 3 passes back across the back line, and then a desperation pass down one side or the other. It's like they practice all week how not to use the midfield. Truly frustrating. I think the 4th goal was on Silva. Would like to see if Barrios was offside but they didn't show any of that in the highlights. Silva had a great chance to get in front of the FCD player but instead let him zip right by and get in position to make the play as difficult as possible for Nick. Speaking of Nick, much has been noted about his tweets yesterday to Pro about some calls in another game. Same for Petke. I think this is a symptom of a team that is looking for answers and is totally frustrated. I can't imagine how pissed Rimando is right now getting hung out to dry time and time and time and time again game after game. Of course he's not the Nick of his prime but damn, play some defense for him. At this rate I can't see how Petke makes through the first half of the season. Waibel should go long before him but unless something turns around pretty quick this season could be history pretty damn soon.
Well, I am happy you go the good parenting moment of showing your daughter some clips of the Keystone Cops when you got home. That, at least, is a positive.
Does anyone else think Silva's goal could have been disallowed? If it'd had more impact in the game I would expect some complaining. He basically just jumped on the defender's back.
The officials are bad. Toledo is the worst of the bunch. They really detract from enjoyment of the game...and the recent games are already difficult to enjoy.
@goobx1 , I laughed at the second one too. To expand upon your observation about the team’s attitude, I was very disappointed at the whining at the refs after that one. “Oh poor us. They couldn’t possibly have caught us sleeping, so obviously the play was illegal and you guys need to disallow that goal”. Getting caught unprepared in set pieces and throw ins has been a RSL characteristic for many seasons.
Alright, work has sucked the last week or so (end of quarter madness) but I finally am at a place I can post on here my thoughts. I have Ford Zone tickets, most everyone here knows that. Typically these seats come with unlimited hot dogs, drinks, and popcorn. In the townhalls some fans (NOT ME OR MY GROUP) brought up a desire to have better food and a variety. They've done that. This game we had grilled chicked sandwiches that I would describe as not bad. My point with that first point is that I was happy with the food and then everything went to shit very quickly. I mean, we give up a goal in the first ********ing minute? Are you serious? I'm not sure what is done in the pregame and halftime talks, but it needs to ********ing stop. How many times has this team come out so insanely flat now? And it wasn't like a punch in the face and RSL responded, had FCD actually tried harder (a theme from the whole night) they could have scored on us at least once more in the first 15. A weird trend in this game was that both teams, especially in the first half, looked really really scared on defense in their own half. The ball spent most of the time in the RSL defensive half so naturally we looked the more scared side. But, once we found a way to break the initial pressure from Dallas, they looked vulnerable on the other end. Something that group will have to figure out as the season goes on. Because of this, we scored the goal we did. When Savarino got that ball and started running to goal it was a 3v6. Dallas had six players on defense to RSL's 3. There is no way we should have even got a shot off, yet FCD seemed to be playing shadow defense and not actual defense. By the time the shot was taken, two more FCD players had dropped in and two more RSL players joined. It was literally a 5v8 and we somehow scored. I'm still not sure how we did. And it seems the team was just as shocked as I'm not sure Savarino was done celebrating by the time we gave up the goal. Say what you will about Glad's lack of positioning and such, he doesn't make these really stupid decisions that Silva is prone to. That touch was god awful and deserved to be scored on. Whoever is in charge of graphics this year at the stadium deserves a raise. The halftime video was cool as hell, as were the player and coaches intros and other items. Kudos to whoever is doing that - they seem to be one of the few people in this organization right now that is passionate about their job. I absolutely hate the way this team plays in possession. Once we win the ball we shift into a 3-4-3 and it's painful as hell to watch with the players we have. With the right sort of talent, this would work or at least be an interesting wrinkle to try, but asking KB to become a 3rd CB while pushing the outside backs into the midfield to join Everton and Rusnak is just flat out not working. In fact, I think the way we possess is causing every other part of this team to fail. On a team level and individual level. It's asking KB and the other CB's to be good with the ball at their feet to start an attack. What I've seen thus far from these players is poorly executed passes or a lack of vision to really cut open a team. Part of that is because our middle 4, in this setup, just aren't a group that makes sense together. Rusnak looks uncomfortable in that role of being a connector, Luiz is a good player but hasn't gelled with the others, Lennon is too one-dimensional in attack to make anything besides a run in behind defenders, and Herrera has the left foot of a blind moose. And so we're left with this bizarre setup of having players not great with the ball at their feet trying to pass to players who haven't shown a great ability to make dynamic runs. In front of that is where the talent lies, at least on the wings, and so we see the pass to bypass the midfield as frequently as we do. Find Savarino, Baird, Bofo, etc as quickly as possible out wide. This becomes too easy to defend. Lucky for us these players (bofo, baird, sava, etc) are talented enough to find space occasionally. But its not consistent. You add in the fact that our number 9 collapses into the space those previously mentioned midfielders are trying to figure out and we look lost. The tactics in possession are a mess. And, like I said before, they lead to issues elsewhere. Rusnak looks as disinterested as I've ever seen him. Bofo and Sava look frustrated because you can tell they feel they don't get support when they finally get the ball after busting their asses. Kreilach is.... doing something. KB is too deep for my liking and Everton is being asked to run a half marathon each game. It's dumb Especially when we lose the ball. By pulling the players this way in possession, once we lose the ball it looks like chaos to get back into a defensive shape that isn't complete swiss cheese. The outside backs get beat on balls behind them a lot because of this, in particular. Having to run back to your own goal while knowing where the ball is just isn't working for them. Look, I want Lennon and Herrera there, and I want them moving forward, but holy ******** this is painful to watch. We just look disjointed. I thought this preseason felt funny because of my personal life (building a house) and those distractions. These games are making me think it wasn't just me. The players are lost. The guy in the seat next to me kept saying "are we in preseason? How are we this bad?" What is really telling to me is that, in the LAFC game, you didn't see these massive issues. The team made a very clear effort to clog the middle of the field and not stretch ourselves in possession. And we were more successful, from a final scoreline perspective (we honestly should have drawn that game). That scares me. Is the best approach for this team to honestly be one that plays really negative soccer and pounce on counters? I'm not sure I can stomach a full year of that But I also can't stomach a full season of the garbage we saw Saturday. That was flat out embarrassing. We were never really in that game. When Dallas tried, they scored. Hell, even when they half tried they created really good chances. Things have to change with this squad in the coming weeks or else we're going to be out of any sort of contention by July.
MLS propaganda site Instant Replay feature, one of the content I do enjoy, agree that Kreilach deserves a red for the head contact. I am a total homer, but I was disappointed not enough mention of the card options for Gruezo stomp or blantant dive after contact from Kreilach. IR did mention Kreilach was right to be pissed about the stomp. https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2019...neys-goal-have-stood-dc-united-instant-replay
agreed I'm confused why we have VAR if not for a moment like that. The ref missed the stomp, that's going to happen. He caught the headbutt like he should have. But come on. A yellow at least. Otherwise you've got KB out there, like he was for the next 15 mins, looking to just absolutely destroy Gruezo.
Most concerning thing from this game: Mike Petke thinks we would have won at full strength Jesus christ
Points 9-12 describe the meat of our issues very well. We don’t have the ball skills and athleticism to do what Petke wants them to do when we play a team that can effectively high press us (which happens to be most teams in MLS).