P/I/P Game 31: L.A. Galaxy vs seattle, SUNDAY 9/25/16, 1:00pm PT

Whoscored ratings here. Pretty accurate. Van Damme was the low scorer of the back four and thats pretty accurate.

https://www.whoscored.com/Matches/1...gue-Soccer-2016-LA-Galaxy-Seattle-Sounders-FC

 

If the Galaxy lads had simply finished all of those good chances the defense could have just sat back and kept compact. Very very unlucky there-especially for Dos Santos. Keane missed a chance with his head off of a Rogers cross and Donovan just missed on a Rogers pass.

Someone needs to politely ask the big bald man to stay back. His runs are not helping.

Seattle was not dominant at all. The scoreline does not say anything about this game at all. I mark this one up as one of the oddities of football and am looking forward to the Dallas game.

 

It had Sarvas, a two years younger Keane and a fit Donovan.

 

OT: Oh man, well, you didn't miss much for the Dodger game...So long Vin! Thank you for all the great calls and it's been a pleasure listening to you for 31 years!

 

The two bolded things above are on the coaching staff. I'm getting pretty pissed at Bruce this year. He is losing a lot of games and losing fans like me. This team is not a team at the moment. It's a collection of stars who don't know how to play together, with a few other talented teammates and role players. A team would not have allowed a defense like that.

 

Says it all, really. Scary shades of 2015.

"OK guys, all we have to do is win and we clinch a playoff spot and the bye".

"OK guys, seriously. This time we HAVE to win to at least get the bye."

"OK we missed out in the bye, but let's at least not get murdered at home so we can at least limp into the playoffs."

This team has the opposite mentality of a championship squad. Capitulates terribly in must-win games against big teams.

 

That's what the announcers said as well but I couldn't disagree more. When you are crossing the ball it is your job get your head up, find your targets and time your pass so it gets to them in stride - not the other way around. But blind crosses - hit and hoping someone is there - are successful about 0.001% of the time. Both Ema and Rogers are guilty of this way too often. But both have done better recently. Rogers found his target once in the last game (a nice cut back pass to I forget whom) and once in this game (to Donovan) and he deserves credit for those. That's probably as many as he's connected with for half a season before that.

 

The Galaxy will make the playoffs, heck they might make a run in the playoffs but...going forward:

Keane and Donovan can stay on as elder statesmen but all the other older players need to go. Husidic needs to remain a bench option primarily. Lleget needs to be played as an 8 or 10 from now on, and get slimmer too. Zardes needs to be played as a forward, that drifts on the wings when needed.

Other than that, the Galaxy need to do some real scouting and maybe look within the academy to build this team up for the coming seasons.

 

He also had a nice cross that Keane missed. On the other it looks like his head was up when he made the pass across the goal mouth. Gio and Keane were to gassed to make the run. When a player makes a run the forwards need to get in the box. If Gordo or Zardes had been in this would not have been an issue.

 

So I admit that at the wife's urging I was trudging toward the exit at 4-1 and missed Keanes pk. I was just watching the highlights and holy crap what a dive by Gerrard to win that penalty. Yikes.

At this stage of the season you have to make the best of what we have. We elected to go older this year and you have to expect that your team will have injuries (we have) and will struggle in high heat (we do) and just try and make the most of it. I guess the only worry is that Bruce is a guy that has won a lot in his career by being a players coach and for always backing his guys. He makes the decision each season who his core is and just backs them to the end. The fact that he's won so many titles doing this just reinforces that plan for him and overall you can't argue with it too much.

That said, if you consider what I think Bruce's core players are :

Zardes (hurt)
Keane
Gerrard
Dos Santos
Jeff L (seriously, I think bruce will always play a De Jong/Dmid player)
Cole
Van Damn

it's hard to see how those non defenders fit into the same starting lineup.

I hope when Gerrard goes we use his DP to get a true target forward. Someone like Alan Gordon but with much more class. I also wouldn't be sad if Keane when off into the sunset and we used his DP spot on a younger dynamic midfielder.

Until then, I would do the following and just hope for the best:

------Keane---
----------Gio------
Boateng-Lleget----Mendiola
------------Jeff L
Cole --JVD--AJ-----Rogers
---------Rowe

Gordon/Magee/Donovan/Gerrard as sub options.

If Zardes was available I'd play him in Mendiola's spot.


That's not a cup winning midfield but I think the youthful movement and energy of Mendiola and Boateng make a difference.

 

This team is missing some of the "fight to the death" mentality that we had with a younger Keane, players like Sarvas, and even pretty-boy Beckham, who always left it all out on the field. That attitude is contagious in the locker room. Unfortunately so is the "oh, well, wait for the next one" attitude that we seem to have this year.

 

It’s weird because I think we actually do. Gordon, Keane, Magee are all that kind of veteran player and at times at least Gordo and Magee have shown that kind of “will”, but like everything else it’s just been inconsistent. That’s arguably what I find so frustrating about this season, there are glimpses of a really good team, I mean we’re still 3rd in goals for, we’ve dropped significantly in goals against over the past 2 weeks, but still in the top half of the table. If I had to define this season in one word: elusive.

 

I think last season's crushing defeat to Portland near the end of the season really set the tone for the team's display in the playoffs. Hope history doesn't repeat itself.

 

This Galaxy team will need to field a team that fights for each other and fights all over the field. I watched the rerun again. It was quite obvious the game turned after Seattle's first goal.

Dos Santos got visibly tired. Unlike the recent games where the Galaxy looked successful, Dos Santo was rarely going deep to defend (55 touches, 2 key passes). Husdic did not have much fight in him which was surprising (31 touches, 0 key passes). He is usually pretty reliable. Boateng has been good lately but I think the heat got to him because he had no battle in him this game (only 26 touches, 0 key passes). Van Damme put in a lot of effort moving forward but he was very very ineffective and caused more harm than good (64 touches, 0 key passes). Cole only had 55 touches and 0 key passes. Larentowicz had only 54 touches.

Effort wise Rogers led the team in touches (82) and key passes (3) followed closely by Lleget with 78 touches and 2 key passes. Keane had 3 key passes to go with 32 touches and 2 goals.

 

Really would have liked to see Gordo come on for Keane early in the 2nd half. Keane was visibly gassed in the 2nd half and apart from him scoring a PK and using all of his energy to pick up a yellow, he didn't offer much. Throw Gordon on and let Gio/Lleget run the show, then bring Landon on for Baggio to get another threat on the field.

Also Steres needs to foul Morris on the firat goal, but he was done no favors by JVD being way out of position. If he's going to bomb forward, then whoever is playing DM needs to drop back and cover that spot.

 

Agreed 100%, but that would be a huge paradigm shift for management. I don't see it happening. Kennedy? Give me a frickin' break.

 

True. You'd expect Dos Santos to finish a couple of those. He's been very clinical with poor chances. It's like he has no mojo when Keane's on the field.