Probably have to get Chicago drunk first, but love that trade for Houston. You're giving way to much trade value to Lloyd. She turns 35 this summer, her skills are in decline and team's view her as a headache at this stage. I'm not convinced that anybody is willing to take her off of Houston's hands, certainly not for real trade value. She's still a good player, but Carli is all about Carli first and that is not good for a locker room. Outcome of this deal would be Houston gets a lot better while Chicago gets worse.
Havent seen anything besides a few min of Boston Portland. Drunk in Seattle now hipstering it up drinking ginger beer cocktails. Will be at game tomorrow
Naw, my husband and I are on vacation. We'd been wanting to do a west coast trip and decided to fly into Seattle and then drive to San Fran. The dates were decided before the schedule released and worked out that Seattle played home this weekend. Seeing a Giants game in SF too.
It's ironic, because Ohai and Menges are both players Ellis has bizarrely snubbed despite their NWSL form.
Observation from the FCKC-Washington game. Sauerbrunn with a foul! .... ...and a yellow card! That never happens.
No way the Red Stars should want Carli Lloyd at any price higher than a low round draft pick. Other than a few games of "the real Carli Lloyd" she sleep walked through her season here. The Red Stars locker room now belongs to Press and JJ Ertz as long as they want to be here.
ARGH! What a golden chance by Ertz, just inches off of 0-3 as she beats everyone but it glances off the post...
Or better yet Riley is. Why is McDonald playing in a back 3? What is going on with coaches and the back 3 this year? I'm not one to believe in conspiracy theories but one minute Ellis is fiddling with back three to disastrous effect and the next minute multiple NWSL coaches are doing the same
Interesting to contrast Lloyd to Sinclair. Christine is there for every game, gives everything she has, and is willing to play wherever on the field and to fill whatever role she is asked. She is a leader in every way. Lloyd can be a great player, but what she does as a team player is limited. Maybe it has something to do with the cultural difference between New Jersey and British Columbia.
I think the "back 3" is in vogue not just in US WoSo but in the global soccer world in general... I've heard it talked about quite a bit (or at least quite a bit more than previously) the past few months in both MLS and EPL.
Well, I have to say I am impressed by what Chicago did in the second part of 1st half. Courage crack was more mental than tactical or physical: after each goal, they looked like a child in a tantrum, obsessively trying to get back in the game but doing it in a chaotic and emotional way, with no rational and composed build up and just charging like a blind ram instead. Any counterattack was enough for Red Stars to make Courage's defense miserably crumble apart. It wasn't tactically well-deployed, and Erceg absence is felt, but I repeat, it's mostly mental: the way they lost the ball in their box (see third goal) or they lost their marking (second) was an utter lack of concentration. I now wonder if the game will go downhill for Courage (they could easily gift even more chances to Chicago in 2nd half) or if they'll somehow manage to regroup at HT, with the help of the coach, and try to play decently in 2nd half. They especially need calm.
Yes, it's somehow a trend, but you need the personnel to adequately try that and you need a long training if you're not used to it. So, my humble advice is, if you don't have all of that, just forget the latest fashion trend and stick to a solid 4-back line-up.
I just hope it doesn't become too much bonkers later today. I have to say I probably couldn't stand something along the lines of SEA 1 ORL 4 with an hat-trick by Marta or anything of the kind! Please, let's stick to some boring, predictable Seattle's win!
Hmm... I've only watched about one game per week live (and never the Lifetime game) until this week, so my sample size is smaller that it's been for others, but this is the first time I've had my feed repeatedly just freeze indefinitely - and I'm watching on the NWSL site right now; had to hit "refresh" multiple times to get things reset. Makes me think that the problems people have been complaining about are not Go90's fault, but the fault of whatever production studio is being used.
Yes, happened to me also (watching matches from the NWSL website streaming), although today I had the screen freezing "just" a couple of times; for the rest it was quite smooth and I didn't have to reload as much often as I had to do other weeks.
And with the Red Stars holding firm for the rest of the second half, NJ becomes the only team still perfect at home.
Chicago finally scored some goals. Why in the world was McDonald playing defense for NC in the first half? Bad coaching decision in my opinion. Despite the announcers hype of Taylor Smith I would have preferred Doniak in the second half rather than Smith for NC. Doniak seems to me a better crosser. Also, a little too much hype tossed toward Christen Press by the announcers. Chicago has many good players. Quite a blitz NC put on to try to catch up. Good for Chicago to weather the storm. Naeher might deserve to be player of the match. The stream was excellent.