Deleon has been the clutchiest DC player in a generation. I was totally happy with him taking that PK. Until he missed it.
im glad NDL is on the team. He’s not out best player, but I’ll take more guys with his dedication to the team. I hope the fans don’t turn on him more.
Dude. It worked. Beerholder is still in the playoffs and we're not. It really sucks watching a game where Columbus can't even fill up their stadium for a playoff game.
NDL missed, so did Baggio -- it ********ing happens, everyone get over it. DCU lost a coin flip contest. If NDL hadn't buried a clutch shot from 18 yards with only a few minutes left, there would be no PK shootout to piss and moan over.
[QUOTE="PSURoss, post: 37242189, member: 25743]Lets be honest, we saw plan B the whole first half of the season. If the Rooney/Acosta connection is shut down, I am not sure what else we have. The wingers whipping crosses into the box? How many crosses do you think Fisher had all season? I don't know the number, but is a pretty good sized number and I know he only had 1 assist for the year and that was right before he blew out his knee . . . The lack of officiating on the cynical midfield play is will hold the league back until they decide to do something about it. A vastly superior team is usually going to over come that kind tactic, but more evenly matched teams will continue to favor the fouling team and that's killed us in the first round the last 2 times we've made the playoffs as a hot 2nd half team riding a hot scorer whether it was Mullins 2 years ago or Rooney this year.[/QUOTE] Exactly.
my seats are not obstructed view, my view is simply no better than RFK. I was not a the match, my work schedule does not allow me to attend weekday matches. I was watching on TV. You have to read a players eyes and body language. His was poor suggesting he would miss. I would have put Mattocks in the NDL slot. He also had fresh legs.
Exactly.[/QUOTE] I totally agree with the main point, but it's easy to forget how effective we actually were at scoring (23 goals in 14 games as a road team!), because we all like the way we've played since. The problem then wasn't scoring, it was defending. Truth is, we have a roster that can be dangerous in a number of ways, now that Rooney is here. IMO, we didn't effectively use our subs or switch up our gameplan to account for the referee or Berhalter's tactics. It's understandable given our recent success (which of late actually came with with little scoring and used a limited palette of players), but it concerns me that it might be a flaw in Ben's coaching of a now Rooney-led team. That said, a fixture of our success has been the success of Acosta. As good as we've been at times, we haven't shown that we can be consistently competitive without Acosta on the field and clicking. That's a critical flaw. There is no "next man up" with him. That's the plan B I'd like to see us work on.
I totally agree with the main point, but it's easy to forget how effective we actually were at scoring (23 goals in 14 games as a road team!), because we all like the way we've played since. The problem then wasn't scoring, it was defending. Truth is, we have a roster that can be dangerous in a number of ways, now that Rooney is here. IMO, we didn't effectively use our subs or switch up our gameplan to account for the referee or Berhalter's tactics. It's understandable given our recent success (which of late actually came with with little scoring and used a limited palette of players), but it concerns me that it might be a flaw in Ben's coaching of a now Rooney-led team. That said, a fixture of our success has been the success of Acosta. As good as we've been at times, we haven't shown that we can be consistently competitive without Acosta on the field and clicking. That's a critical flaw. There is no "next man up" with him. That's the plan B I'd like to see us work on.[/QUOTE] We are totally screwed if Acosta is not on the field. We've consistently seen that no one across the midfield can create like Acosta. Arriola, Asad, Zoltan and even Rooney are totally different players who are reliant on having someone to create for them on some level or at least have someone to play off of. And that has been evident for 2+ years now. And I am not sure what you do in that situation. Go look at other teams and see what they produce when their #10 is out. How is Columbus without Higuian? Atlanta without Amiron? Dallas w/o Diaz? Look what we did to Montreal when we neutralized Piatti. I think #10 and striker are the toughest positions to have credible backups for. You need that guy regularly playing another spot on the field to remain in the flow and keeping themselves match fit and sharp. I think thats a tough, tough ask.
It only seems practical to do with personnel if you happen to have a young up-and-coming academy kid who is capable of some creative play. If you have the wherewithal to make that happen, more power to you - do it. For the rest of us slobs, it takes a gameplan that doesn't rely on a creative 10. They exist. I think maybe for us that would be playing a 442 with Rooney as a false 9 beside Mattocks. You can play with Stieber, Asad, Arriola and Moreno (in ascending order of defensiveness) in the 11,7, and one of the CM slots, depending on the opponent. Key for us seems to be the two 8s/DMs, whatever you want to call them, in front of the back 4, with one of them being Canouse. That's our requirement for a solid defense, and anything in front of that that works is worth trying.
For sure. I didn't mean it as anything more than an opinion. I just think the choice of DeLeon isn't really a fair thing to criticize Olsen for... but that's also just my opinion. The lateness of the subs seems to be a much bigger factor in the loss than the choice of PK takers. PKs are a crapshoot. Are you getting on him for putting Rooney or Acosta on the list? Cause they looked really really gassed by the end of 120 min.
I agreed that Mattocks would not be who I put in the 5 spot and I view that as a problem. All 4 midfielders took PKs and no one has confidence in Mattocks doing much other than tapping in sitters leaves you with 4 defenders to take a PK, 3 of whom had gone 120 minutes, so that left NDL in a tough spot. I have no idea what his plan was, but skying that ball over the center (?) of the bar was a bit disheartening, especially since it looked like Rooney failed to execute and Acosta tried to out wait a guy who has demonstrated that he's excellent in out waiting and reacting to a shooter.
I am getting on him/Ashton (who I think made the call) for the order. I would have had Rooney in the 3 hole. Steiber 1, Asad 2, Rooney 3, Acosta 4 and Mattocks 5. If you wanted Canouse 5 I would take that.
Good call with your second guessing. The stuff on Rooney's attempt deflated the crowd and probably the crowd. Also, you'd probably want to save your mentally tough shooters for the high pressure shots at or near the bottom of the first five.
I'll venture that there is no way Wayne wasn't taking the first kick. This is his team and he'd inisist on taking. I'd be dissapointed in him if he didn't. And Nick may have insisted on his opportunity. He's been with the club for 8 years and if he wanted a kick he would have gotten one. At the pro level the players have a lot of say in who takes PKs.
And my point is that I want my best kick taker in the 3 hole. I have a system, that has been successful over the years at various different levels. That is why I posted the order I did. It is how I would have done it. Having your best kick taker go first is wrong.
Yup. I guess the good folks in Cbus figure that now that the Crew has been #Saved, there's no reason to show up any more. Kinda like what they did when the Crew were still on the brink of leaving for Verde pastures elsewhere . . . or the year before that, now that I think of it . . . or the year before that . . . I'm glad as hell that one of the Original Ten is staying in Cbus, but you have to admit: they've never really packed Mapfre consistently. Just sayin'.
The team made 2 of 5. The order wasn't the problem. Exhausted legs combined with the best PK stopper in MLS (maybe outside of Utah if you wanna get technical about it). He guessed perfectly on three (or maybe all four, I forget) shots that were on frame.
Order does matter. Steffan's saves were both to his right, the shooters left. If Rooney sees him make the save on Acosta he can adjust and go the other way. Steffan made no saves on kicks to his left the shooters right. Order does matter.
Didn't he also come extremely close to getting the other two shots. I'm pretty sure he did on one of them. Sample size is far far too small over the course of the 2 kicks you are proposing that Rooney would have seen to make a difference. DC took two pretty good penalties and 2 poor ones and one pretty average one. When you do that, switching the order isn't going to help you much. Especially against a really good goalie. I'm not saying it isn't smart to put your players in a strategic order, just that I'm don't think that is the nit to pick when breaking down this game. It's easy to criticize the order in hindsight. The sub mistakes were a problem that was evident about at least half an hour before he finally made the attacking subs.
Notable about this was that the twitter account came back online a few times and most recently with the playoff game.
I'd love to hear what your system is and the logic behind it. I just roll it out to my best PK taker 1-5. Probably dumb idea, but I play a lot of checkers.