Just back from the game - - Disgusting. No effort or heart. And the security guys were way over the line in the Beer Garden tonight. Apparently you can't say the word "ass". They had been really reasonable until tonight, but they were very overbearing. Might as well shut 'er down if that is they way it is going to be. Very sad. Mark Cuban save us!!
I just laughed for the first time in an hour and a half. But... (think cleaning lady from Family Guy) no... Mr. Cuban... no...
Gutting. I think the only word for this team is snakebit. Two injuries, some near misses, and then the same old immature shite that gets the bounced around the league gets them bounced by Charlotte. Jackson's red was just one stellar example of a boneheaded play that did nothing but hurt the team. First time in years I've heard the "Fire Schellas" chant rattling in the stadium. And it wasn't just a few people.
Wasn't there. Didn't see it. So glad I didn't waste gas/time/blood/sweat/tears to see it. Dreading the Houston game I'm driving to, even with no expectations. Want to change the title of this thread to "The Crash of '12." I thought we'd at least win this game. Disgusting, even with all the shit that's gone wrong with this team. This team needs to take a quick vacation. Do trust-fall exercises, hold hands in a circle, and have a good cry. They have a few weeks to prepare for Houston. If they can somehow win that, it might galvanize them to turn their season around. Another horrid game and we're looking at a very uphill battle to make anything out of this season.
I don't care about the injuries. I don't care how many other MLS teams lost tonight. We should not be losing to a team like this, period. These players have no intelligence, emotional or otherwise. What Jackson did was borderline demented, but when you've also got Castillo continually running straight into defenders, no-one willing to take a shot no matter how open they are, and Scott Sealy going 90 minutes practically rooted to the spot for all the "movement" he was doing, of course we were going to lose. That Luna was languishing on the bench the whole time Sealy was doing nothing bothers me immensely, no matter what some here may think of the kid. All of these are coaching issues. Hyndman created a team in 2010 that was capable of winning it all, and has since traded it in for a team he has no control over. To make matters worse, those few players left from that team all seem to have issues that have made them shadows of their former selves. Hartman is showing signs of age, and Seitz is not a worthy backup; Hernandez has lost several steps and a lot of his bite, though none of his temper, and is now merely a red card waiting to happen; John is out of here at the end of the season, regardless; Ihemelu is going the way of Twellman; Shea still hasn't recovered from being overplayed last year; who knows what kind of player Ferreira will be if/when he ever returns. I know we've had problems all season long with injuries and bad calls, but these are just convenient excuses. Hyndman's whole plan since mid-2011 seems to be "just wait until Ferreira is back" with no back-up plan and very little depth. His failure to adequately stock the roster has been brought into really sharp focus this season. Some people are saying that a mid-season coaching replacement is a bad idea and that consistency is key, but consistency is getting us nowhere. Some teams need to be shaken up to get then out of a funk, make them realize that actions (or failure to act) has consequences, and perhaps it is time this team is shook.
An extremely good source says that the locker room is a complete shambles, which is really no surprise. On a funny Schellas note, I have a copy of an internal "teaching guide" that was given to a group of players that looks like it was written by a middle school coach trying to teach the most rudimentary skills to U12s. It's comically embarrassing to think that it was targeted at people who get paid to do this for a living...
On a good note, I thought Moises Hernandez looked outstanding. Mind you the competition was not MLS level, but he looked like the best player on the field for long stretches of the match.
Best part of 2012, so far, was getting Mark Followill to do color commentary. He was pretty good last night and he gets better every game. Thats about the most positive thing I can think of with regards to last night.
Would Hernandez be a nice substitution for either Marcelen, Hernandez or Jacobson in our deadening center?
I was wondering who that was. I really liked him, too. He should be on TV. (Meanwhile, how is Brian Dunseth getting NBC gigs????)
I was sitting right in front of Hernandez for the first half yesterday. He's calm on the ball and makes some good passes, but he's extremely left-footed. More so than Jair, even. Multiple times I saw Moises pass up an easy pass with the right foot in favor of turning through pressure to get on his left foot. You can survive that on the outside, but it's not a good trait for a central midfielder.
Yeah, I was kidding. I know nothing of the Mavericks, but I did know that because of Followill's interview on Soccer Today a few weeks back. But seriously, he SHOULD be on TV doing FCD games instead of random mashups of other people's PBP guys and Dunseth's verbal diarrhea.
I don't see how it's entirely fair to hold Schellas accountable for all that's going wrong. I'd like to see any team in MLS do this well with so many starters missing so regularly for so long. Nobody has depth like that. To be fair, this is all easy for me to say because I absolutely do not care about the US Open Cup in the slightest. In my opinion, this removes a significant distraction from a struggling team.
Put me in the camp of it's time for a change, either coaching or players, at this point I don't care which. I am squarely stuck in the realm of apathy with this team, they are miserable to watch play
I'm still with SH. Every team has a bad year here and there. That being said, he really needs to focus on discipline (not kicking balls at ref's, not stampeding opposing keepers, and apparently some fundamentals).
Just FYI, Followeezy is the TV voice of the team whenever Mavericks duty does not conflict. He didn't call some of the recent games due to the possibility of Mavs even though they were knocked out these things are planned much farther out. He'll be back for the next FSN SW game.
I think some credit is due to the Charlotte GK'er and their execution of a very defensive game plan. I read above questioning why Luna was on the bench. Easy. His performance against Colombus cost us two goals in 12 minutes. Plus, you only have 3 subs. 2 of those subs are eaten into fairly early in the match due to our constant companion, Injury. I thought that Moises H. filled in competently for Lloyd. And, I would have assumed that Marceline would be competent enough to improvise as a central defender when GJ went down with our second head injury of the day seeing as we were then fresh out of central defenders. But, Marceline would let us down with his marking on the first goal. Apparently, the marking seemed to horrify the coaching staff as well, who immediately switched AJ with Marceline. Keep in mind that up until this part of the story, we were hitting post after post and the Charlotte GK'er's sweat revealed a hidden Superman logo under his shirt. I thought that our final third tactics were not the best. We kept trying to slip those diagonal inside balls through a crowded defense. It was shortly there after that our other good friend, Panic made his appearance. Individual players tried to do too much. And, after taking one too many cracks to the back and face.... Jackson invited our other good friend, Frustration, to join the party. The 2nd goal, was a result of throwing caution to the wind. Keep in mind that as frustrated, panicky, and injury depleted as we were.... we were by far still dominating this game in every conceivable category except scoring. But, that is the case every week. We lack technical expertise. We have speed and athleticism. We have youth and experience. But, we have yet to ever replace the technical finishing ability from multiple positions. In short, I think we have loads of athletes. What we lack are soccer players. And, this problem persists even when some of the suspended guys come back.
What's scary is that we've only reached 2 goals in a game three times all season. Our per-game scoring this season reads as follows: 2-1-1-1-1-2-0-1-1-0-0-1-1-1-2-0 One clean sheet in 16 matches isn't good enough for a team averaging less than a goal per match...
One season I would like to see FCD state that the USOC is a priority and every starters (available) will start every USOC game. The name on the trophy is enough for us to want to win it. Also the winner gets into the CONCACAF CL, correct? Given that in MLS Play you need only to finish in Top 5 of the conference to get in playoffs, I don't mind it if a few MLS reg. season games we are not at 100% as all our starters played a few nights before. It needs to be prioritized as an important piece of hardware and a competition we need to win, given our MLS Cup futility....