Well this team literally has nothing left to play for but MLS Cup and an outside shot at The Supporters’ Shield. This season will be a failure without one of those.
I don't know if I'm panicking, but I am settling, and lowering... Right now, all I want is a goal against San Jose. Just a goal and I might be happy for a minute. Aaaaaagggghhhhhh!
I'm losing faith in this coach and this organization. Changes need to be made and I'm not sure who can make them. #lagalaxy— Corner Of The Galaxy (@GalaxyPodcast) June 25, 2014 I agree with this. Anyone else worried about our future?
This is a group of chumps, some of which are on their way out. I even want my two DPs packing. Get a massive overhaul in the offeseason to prevent the same old story. Sign even Daniel Jackson. Or Jackson Martinez from Colombia. Anything to prevent this type of useless maggotry from this joke of a side.
Without any reinforcements over this summer this game will be a microcosm of the rest of our season. We will win a couple games here and there but in the end it will come down to our finishing, or lack thereof. Most of us have already beat the horse down to the bone about the players brought in over the offseason and the beginning of this season and as the season goes on we will continue to see these deficiencies exposed. I am with Guesman and Co on this: I have felt since last year that we might be stagnating and have wondered who has the authority to bring down the hammer. As @dashiel said, if we don't bring home at least one of the remaining trophies for this season there will have to be questions asked. Hopefully Bruce can bring this together because this is not looking good. Was hoping we would finally be able to get over this jinx and the Stanford jinx but I don't know about this weekend anymore. Maybe the shooting boots coming back with a vengeance this weekend.
Yeah I just posted something similar in the Bruce thread. It may seem reactionary but it's actually a long held belief about the direction we seem to be going. Also I think Bruce is so entrenched he'll leave when he wants essentially.
I think we have problems, but I'm less bummed about this particular game than the rest of you. Mostly because Goodwin was amazing. I don't know if the stats will be put up, but he straight stoned many many shots. We lived in the Carolina half for the last hour of the game. They got 1 shot and finished. Story of our season. (Also, that really was a PK we should have had at the end). But, I will join in the chorus that says we have problems because of our overall trend (not just this game). Not placing my head in the sand. The biggest being the midfield. 1) Husidic is NOT an attacking player. Stop trying to make him that. He is a black hole when it comes to the attack that we are not getting out of. Bruce needs to recognize this and JUST FIND SOMEONE ELSE. 2) Cross + pray should not be our game plan. You have two amazing combiners of the ball in the middle and you completely NEGATE their ability to do anything when the play is to send the ball into the fullback and cross into the middle. They are short. Recognize it, and do something else. 3) We partially cannot do something else because we don't have the midfield for it. Here's what happens: pass - pass - pass - pass cross - headed out pass - pass - pass -pass cross - headed out Landon gets frustrated, drops deep Landon picks up the ball at center circle and tries to circulate it Husidic has no idea what to do with the ball/Keane tries to dribble a defense on his own/Gyasi flubs it I want to watch the replay, but once again, at around minute 105 what do I see? Landon at the center circle. HE CANNOT BE A SHUTTLER ON THIS TEAM. The tactics we are playing are turning one of our most creative players on the ball into a deep distributor. This should be a giant red flag. For the person that said "glad LD is showing JK why he should be in Brazil" - watch the game. Watch it. Watch him drop deep to pick up the ball. This is a tactical problem we have not solved. 4) Other teams have figured this out: Husidic doesn't attack. Juni and Sarvas are busy defending in midfield. Sit men on LD/Keane - Husidic and Ishizaki can't break the bunker. LD drops deep - the cycle continues. 5) When you start a midfield with Kenny Walker in it you are adding 0 to the attack. So don't be surprised when Keane can't make something out of literally nothing for 60 minutes. Then when you sub Landon on, don't be surprised when he has to drop deep to start our attack. 6) Leonardo. STOP THE AGONY. These are problems Bruce needs to take a hard look at. We don't have the creative midfield we need, and our tactics right now are head scratching.
By the way - that is now two tourneys that Leonardo has dropped us out of. Bruce, get an effing clue. EDIT: Sorry, he wasn't alone tonight of course, but still. It's not just because of him.
I mostly agree with your post except for the bolded part. Either we are the most unlucky team in the world or opposing goalkeepers seem to keep having the games of their lives against us. I personally think it is a finishing problem and not that all these guys are "getting up for a game against big ole LA Galaxy." A couple inches to the left or right and most of those shots are goals. I don't know what happened to this team but we used to be ice cold. We would get one chance against a team and would punish them. Now we don't even have the confidence to finish breakaways. Coupled with our idea-less offense, tactically and technically we are just failing right now. Bruce is who he is and he isn't going to change. Either Kirovski is going to strike gold over the summer or this will end up being another disappointing season. I wonder if this season does end up like that will there be any accountability at the club? It doesn't seem like it but hopefully I end up being wrong. Lots of worrying signs over the last couple years creates a hole we have to continually dig ourselves out of. What's sad is we didn't have to do it like this. Starting from scratch allows a team to build a great foundation for later growth and it seems like our foundation is starting to crumble.
The finishing wasn't good (in particular for Keane, not sure what's going on there), but Goodwin did make several very decent saves. Go back through the game thread - many of them are remarked on. That said, too much of our gameplan was cross and hope. No matter what you do, our two players that are 5' 8" in the box are not going to finish those. This isn't a "players didn't show up" situation imo. We are seeing the same problem we've been seeing for weeks: not enough creativity in the midfield, Landon drops deep, leaving Keane up top all by himself trying to make something out of nothing. That's not just finishing. That's why I think it's fair to talk panic buttons at this point because it Just. Isn't. Changing.
The Galaxy lost? As a non Spanish speaker, I was watching TWC Deportes, and I could have sworn they started showing credits at the end of full of full time. I thought it was a 0-0 tie with a 2nd game to follow like the English FA. I guess it saved me the frustration of watching another half hour of crappy soccer by the Galaxy. Right now it appears that there are AYSO U-10 teams that play better in the final third. How many times is Robbie going to try dribbling past or through 3 or more defenders only to turn the ball over? Its a joke. Landon played like he had just put up 90 against Portugal and then taken a red eye to Cary. Zardes is like the kid everybody wants to shoot because its never, ever on frame. Oh well. And finally for my pet peeve. TWC, do you really think you get better ratings showing a 6 month old high school football game for probably the 47th time instead of showing the Galaxy live? How much could it cost to use the Deportes feed and either have an announcer do the game from the studio in LA (right next to the Deportes announcers who also seemed to be in LA).
My ask: instead of blaming the players, take a look at the underlying tactics. I had no problems with the team's effort tonight. When the tactics aren't working, you see this game. I just don't think this is about "trying hard enough." EDIT: Although I did blame Leo.
Didn't watch the game (it's a Bruce team, USOC games are reserve or in this case preseason games to be played at half speed) but catching up with the thread, I believe what Berks is saying. Landon is the smartest player on the field. Robbie may be more talented, Omar more physically gifted, but Landon is the smartest. For the years I've been watching him, with us or USMNT, he just goes and solves the problem at hand. Whether it's playing wide and tracking back to help the FB, pinching inside, etc, etc. I've learned that if you want to see where the weakness on the field is (whether the coach knows it or not) follow Landon.
I think the twcd commentators got it right, some people on the team showed up today and thought we should win just cuz they showed up. I also agree with them when they say that considering the team we took, we should have had the game, and it's a massive failure that we didn't take it, and serious questions need to be asked of the organization as a whole. This was disappointing.
Tough to pick a man of the match - Leo, Keane, or Bruce? Hmmmm... While all three are worthy candidates I clearly have to go with Bruce. Definitely MOM..... for Carolina of course. Leo can't help that he's slow physically and mentally and sucks at the game of soccer, and while Keane did mess up 100% of the time this game he gets a little bit of a pass because of his effort and all he's done for us over the years. But Bruce! Wow, what can you say? Full credit has to go to him. Without Bruce's decision to play Leo -- regardless of how bad he is or how many games he's lost for us -- this game ends up being one of those frustrating can't-get-a-break 0-0 ties and then a shootout we likely win. But Bruce was going to let a Railhawk 3-peat slip out of his fingers so he went full Leo! Go Bruce!!
You know what's funny? I feel like LA Galaxy II would've had a better chance of winning than our first team...