It's not that our guys didn't care - you get worn out when they chase all day. LA just used the space and skill to make us run in circles for 90 minutes, and we got worn down. That's what happens when keep-away works so well.
The last 15 of 2014 Credit to LA and their field crew on setting up a massive home field advantage. The grass was noticeably longer and played slower than RSL was used to. This killed us. The long diagonal ball that LA wanted to pull off tonight wouldn't have happened (at least not as effectively) with a faster pitch. Give credit to the whole LA staff, from Bruce to the ground crew, for executing a game plan. There is a lot of talk about Donovan and killing us. This deserves mention, no doubt. But the guy that turned LA from being scared to attack to flat out dominating us was Ishizaki. I have no idea how this guy doesn't start above Husidic every game. Ishizaki deserves a ton of praise. I've never seen Tony Beltran play that bad. Sure, his offensive game leaves a lot to be desired, but his defense has always been something you could count on. I'd put this down as the worst game he has played, ever. Like Rich Balchan type bad. How ironic that it was on the same pitch. Speaking of the Stub Hub, I think we must have angered the soccer gods with our win against LA to start the season. Since then, we haven't scored a single goal and have registered something like 5 shots on goal across 4 matches. We lost each game at the Stub Hub, a place we historically have been half decent, and have been completely and utterly outplayed. Bruce Arena is a gigantic ******** face. But the dude knows how to coach a team that should win. I know Olsen is probably the more correct choice, but I can't help but say that Arena would get my vote for Coach of the Year. Every goddamn year this guy pulls this off. He has his team peak when it should and play incredibly. Tip of the hat to one of my least favorite guys in MLS. Speaking of ******** faces - landon donovan is a legend. We all were talking shit as it would have been cool to end his career but the guy is showing why he is the best US player of all time. One grip with the guy - you're up 4-0 and commit a pretty obvious foul on Joao Plata near midfield. Don't be an asshat and argue with the call and subsequent (deserved) yellow. You fouled the guy. Play on. Starting Luke and Ned, obviously in hindsight, was a recipe for disaster. Arena countered that adjustment perfectly with his. Putting AJ De La Garza and Ishizaki in not only countered Ned's addition, but it exploited our very obvious weakness. I don't think Gil makes such a massive difference to make this a game, but it wouldn't have been as bad. Know who else really struggled in this match? Javier Morales. He was a ghost. Twellman kept bitching about Sabo dropping too deep. Maybe instead of just yelling at him, he should look at why Sabo is doing it. Javier couldn't do shit with the ball. Nobody could, but we rely on Javi so much that it's especially damning when he struggles. To be honest, everyone not named Plata or Rimando should have been subbed at half. The team effort was worse than when we played against Chivas at Stub Hub. I didn't even know that was possible on a professional level but low and behold, there it is. I find it ironic that Keane scored a goal like he did after all the discussion about Sabo floating offsides too much and not making an effort to get backed. That right there is why you do it. I think that was literally the exact same scenario I laid out. Clever ball in to Donovan, Kenae pulls back onsides just in time to receive and finish. That why you sit offsides sometimes. Borchers completely lost him and never was able to recover. Schuler's play is even more awkward with the mask on. Something I didn't think possible but it was. Minutes 46-85 might have been the most depressing for RSL I've ever seen. Quite obviously the worst we've had this year, but I'd wager we didn't even play that bad back in the dark ages of 2005-2007. It was comical defending, moronic defense, and an offense that couldn't slap their own ass with both hands. All of this added up is a really bad image for Cassar. It is ultimately his job to get the squad prepared for the match. To be focused mentally. To be able to weather poor play and respond. Cassar failed. Flat out, this was his worst game as coach. If there ever was a time to call the end to an era, last night was it. It's time to part ways with the slow older players occupying way too much cap space. It's time to rethink the way this team plays. It's time for someone to be hyper critical of the RSL roster laid in front of them. I know we're a club known for caring for our players and probably overpaying or keeping too long, but this offseason needs to be an exception. 2014 was a year of meh to me. Nothing really jumps out when I think about the year. KB playing in the world cup was probably the highlight - which is telling as it really had nothing to do with RSL at the end of the day. I'm hopeful this was more of a transition year than we wanted to make it out to be. Cassar and co need to find an original identity. Get out of the shadow of Jason Kreis and make a name of your own.
Postgame comment from Cassar: On the difference between the first leg and the second leg of the Western Conference Semifinal: "Their movement tonight was fantastic. Landon [Donovan] was everywhere. They were a little bit stagnant at our place. Their movement wasn't quite what it was tonight and we weren't ready for that and I am not sure why." Postgame comments from Donovan: On Real Salt Lake: "They're a team that is very good when they have the ball, and when they don't have the ball, they struggle because they have a lot of guys that don't want to defend through the midfield and upfront. We did a really good job of making them try to defend. When you have [Alvaro] Saborío having to chase back in his own end to defend guys and not in front of your goal, that makes a big difference. We're one of the few teams that can flip the table on them. Most times they go into games and dominate possession wise. We're one of the teams that can change that so that was part of it. But then at the end of the day, you have to take the chances and we took our chances tonight. I was a little surprised that Luis [Gil] didn't play. I thought he was their best player last week so that was a little surprising to see that he wasn't on the field to start. We've scored a lot of goals here, and won a lot of games here so you can't expect them to come throw passion to the wind and go all out crazy because we're a good counter attacking team. I think they wanted to keep the game close as long as they could, but fortunately the early goal put them under a lot of pressure."
This. Plata's hustle was negated by his play. Did he have any good passes? Did any of our guys have good passes? Credit to LA on applying instant pressure when we got the ball. Something RSL failed to do. Honestly, why were we giving them so much space? Donovan's final goal was a prime example of the terrible defending on the night. He just waltzed into the box unmarked. Honestly...
As visitors, we're used to playing in our white, away kits. We kept passing to the wrong team because we thought they were us. That's all I got.
Noticed this as well, the pitch was long, seemingly dry and a little lumpy. Totally played into the LA game plan which was to have us on our heels from second one with long-diagonals and over the top delivery that pushed our back line even further back. If you rewatch the first 90 seconds, it was insane how different they came out when compared to their RioT performance a week earlier, there are like 8-10 long and diagonal balls within the first couple minutes that had our CB's and FB's scrambling. As the game progressed our backs were under such assault that they weren't pulling the line forward, making it all the more simple for LA to start to break and run directly at our 18. Was almost as if we were rope a doped into thinking that is what LA was capable of last week and that they were on their last legs offensively. What really sucks is that if we would have finished last week, we could have easily beat them 3 or 4 - 0. So crazy the difference a week, a couple lineup changes, a longer stickier field made in this series.
Well, I was. They're in the dirties now. Too bad they didn't work. Funny, my phone had the same problems. Text messages all sent at about 7:30 on my way back to Las Vegas.
@bballshawn I will give you the benefit of the doubt, but coming in this board in the middle of a complete thrashing is not the right time to tell us to ditch the diamond next year. Please, give us a day or two to calm down.
Not sure, was there five rows up for the first game and the winds were a little whippy at first but then died down 10-15 minutes into the first half. We definitely keep the pitch short and wet at RioT, didn't seem to have the same quick movement last night at Stub Hub. Needless to say, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde from the Galaxy, they didn't show a tenth of the endeavour in the first game than they put on last night. Interesting retrospective, even without the right foot of Beckham leading the break, they are still a counter-focused team, is that the only way Arena likes to play?
Almost 24 hours later, and I still don't know what I watched. Have not seen what appeared to be an emotional meltdown like that since my daughter's U13 team when the coach thought it would be fun to have all the forwards play defense and and the defenders play as forwards for a half. I can't even point out exactly what went wrong (though Beltran seems to stand out), the list seems too long to mention.
Part of that might have been that they didn't really water it prior to kick. Their sprinklers came on but didn't rotate. I assume it was mechanical, rather than gamesmanship but you never know. Considering RSL likely lost MLS Cup last year because they were playing on a skating rink, your (but mostly Bruce Almighty's) whining about this issue is laughable.
Only good I can think of is that Beltran can no longer be burned by Donovan for a goal again, like ever. Thats all I got.
If we were roughly 200 miles from another club, I think you would see RSL be more open to it, as well. The closest for RSL (cRapids) is roughly twice as far.
Chivas Moab. Make it happen! Actually, if I never see a team in the US named "Chivas", it will be too soon.
Nice one like it. The starlings ate quite a sight to behold - even though I think there was more of them two years ago. That doesn't look like a this year picture I'v e not seen them that dense this year but I could be wrong As for the other picture it's an affront to the donkey and anyway Sabo (post injury model) doesn't move about enough to find a hole to fall in. Sabo shouldn't be a problem next year any sensible manager would jettison him as part of reducing the pensioners on the team which was part of the problem in the match. Older players slowing down, no fresh blood to do their runing for them, and when things are going badly not a s motivated as they could be because they've done it all before Who else should be encouraged off the Payroll?
I hope you never go away, gretnapie; I just love your posts. Same for phills. Some of you put him on ignore, but you're missing out - the entertainment value of his posts can't be overstated. I tend to chalk it up to garbled transmissions between Earth and Mars, where phills apparently lives, and gretnapie's place on Neptune. I have it on pretty good authority that these two guys are former sports commentators. I think that's gretnapie on the left and phills on the right (before they retired (or were forced) to their respective planets). (I kid, I kid - love you guys)