Only 4 games in but… 1. I think Bou brings that intangible shot out of nowhere. I think he did it in our SS year and I hope he does it again this year. Maybe if his detractors got their way, he would have sat and we’d have scored BECAUSE he wasn’t in. Who knows…. But I think that is one of the reasons he is still starting. Goals need to come from somewhere. 2. Is it Buck’s job to lose now? 3. I’ve heard announcers/press claim Vrioni is still adapting to the physical play of MLS. For whatever reason, he seems to be finding it hard to get minutes. I’m starting to really hope Bobby Wood has a fantastic year and to wonder what the heck is going on with Vrioni.
Nashville is the most MLS team in MLS. They do all their shopping within the league, and field a mostly domestic lineup. In fact, they only had one international player on the field at the start, and that's Mukhtar. So credit to them for being respectable with what's actually a fairly contrarian approach. But yeah, you get some classic mid-table soccer from them. The other weird thing was how many guys on the field had seen some time with the USMNT: Jones, Kessler, Polster and Wood for the Revs, Moore, Zimmerman, McCarty, Bunbury, and Lovitz for Nashville. That speaks volumes, I think... about something.
Going in, I thought 0-0 was most likely outcome, but maybe the Revs could steal a goal for a 1-0 win, and that's what they did. It took Bou beating 3 defenders and a perfectly placed shot off the post to score. According to the xG chart, Bou only had a 3.74% chance of scoring on that shot. By comparison, his 28' breakaway (that he skied) had a 33.38% chance. Polster did a good job keeping Muhktar in check. Defense was good for most part, except when Zimmerman rang the post (34.06% xG). It's hard to judge your number 9 (Wood/Vrioni combo) against a team like Nashville, but so far they have combined for 1 goal in 4 games, so on pace for 8. That's not good enough.
I upgraded my seats for this game and took some pics that are worth sharing... You can check them out here.... https://www.amazon.com/photos/shared/K74Z7_D6SW2hRPpjdSOG9A.Iycg_0Q0EBzian1bKoO9DQ You'll see I got some shots from some key sequences... 1.) Zimmerman's header off the goalpost 2.) Bobby Wood opportunity 3.) Bou's goal I also love the last shot from the final whistle where you will see a devastated Nashville player in the foreground with a celebratory Kessler in the background behind him.
Sorry, the link only applied to one pic. Let's see if this works..... https://www.amazon.com/photos/shared/lvwpXoCUQjCsh3KZRwejcA.e0-Br5SzK34aySDiu1-ZTj
Yes, this works better. It looks like it's in 'backwards order' though. If you are cycling through I would start at the bottom and work backwards because some of the pics are sequences. One interesting 'post game' tidbit... Because we had great seats in the President Club we wanted to take in the whole experience, so we even stuck around post game and watched some players do additional runs/drills after the game. THis group included Boateng, Gonzalez, Altidore, Esmire, and Rivera. A fan in the fort made a comment that Altidore didn't like. Altidore shouted something back and started walking about again. The fan then shouted something else. Gonzalez sensed Altidore was getting irritated and tried to hold him back, but Altidore went right over to the FORT and got into a verbal altercation with the fan. Not a good look for the home crowd. We shouldn't be treating our own players poorly. On a brighter note, Teal Bunburry went over to the FORT right after the game and then took a few pics with some fans in the President's Club. I thought that was a classy move.
I saw the Altidore incident referenced on Twitter. Why would anyone do that? Jozy's long in tooth and maybe doesn't finish the season here, but he's had a very good career and more importantly, he's a Rev.
There's always gonna be knucklehead fans... I remember when some Italian guy told Walter Zenga that the Revs were a Serie C team and he jumped over the railing and chased him down in the parking lot, followed by lots of loud arguing in Italian! I'm sure no one is more disappointed than Jozy himself about how things have gone here. After his loan to the Mexican club (Leon?) I was surprised to see him back, but it could be that he couldn't find a more suitable situation. Which is both telling and sad.
I noticed this as I was leaving the Fort and had a quick discussion with the person who made the comments. It was noted to the person that this wasn't acceptable.
Kessler in the TotM XI, Bou makes the bench: MLS Team of the Matchday | Kessler honored again after helping Revs to another clean sheet By Jeff Lemieux Monday, Mar 20, 2023, 02:00 PM
Haven't seen the competition, but Bou's goal should be in contention for GOTW - scoring off the near-post on a sharp angle is pretty special, as was the power and placement - Willis had NO chance.
Yes, Bou was nominated: https://www.mlssoccer.com/news/vote-for-goal-of-the-matchday-mls-matchday-4 But Almada's free kick is running away with it (89%).
This was an outstanding result - knocking off an undefeated team, scoring on an unscored-upon team ... all without our best player, captain and main cog in the machine. While it seems like a 1-0 created out an outstanding individual effort (with quality buildup) is a narrow margin of victory, the Revs were all over the Nashville goal mouth leading up to the goal. And, this game always seemed like a first goal wins kind of game, since both teams are so heavily relying on their defenses at this stage of the season. Noel Buck continues to impress, continuing to mature and find plays to make. He's already become a tough guy to move out of the starting lineup and he's on his way to being a tough one to take off the field at any point. Really nice bounce-back game for Blessing. This was exactly the type of performance I was hoping for when we acquired him and exactly what we've need in dmid for a while. While Polster is good at what he does, what he does has some serious limitations (one play exhibited it perfectly - he received the ball laterally facing the left wing, had Bye totally alone behind him on the right wing, yet passed it back to someone in his field of vision, thus slowing the attack and allowing Nashville to re-organize. Unless he's under high-pressure, a player at that level needs to know what's going on behind him). One challenging shot from Muhktar early, but overall seemed like a quietish game for Petrovic - or maybe I've just become used to him making difficult plays look routine(?). We're #3 in league in points (2nd in the east), yet I saw one power ranking had us at 17.
It's noteworthy that our midfield cohesion completely disappeared when Buck got taken off the field (along with Wood, when Rennicks and Vrioni came in). I don't think that was coincidence. From that point on, we lost all connectivity between the defense/d-mids and the attackers, and ended up playing route-one ball to minimal effectiveness the rest of the night. Aside from being ugly, it shows that Buck has a vision that a lot of our guys don't. (It also shows a puzzling substitution choice by Bruce - why put a straight forward in for Buck, rather than someone who can hold and distribute even a little bit like Esmir, Makoun, or Tico? I don't take issue with subbing out Buck per se, but if we kept someone in that role, the rest of the evening would have been a lot less stressful....)
I think it was clear that he felt that we were going to have to defend our way through the rest of that one - at least the swap of Rennicks for Buck convinced me of that. He wanted someone to chase, harass and pressure the Nashville back line to hamper their delivery - and brought in Omar to contest for high balls into the area.
Also, although Rennicks hasn't spent much time in his senior career being goal dangerous, its important to keep some semblance of balance late in the match. If you have 0 attackers, especially wide, then you just invite too much pressure and allow the opponent to put 10 guys in your box without threat of conceding. Rennicks will work hard, win balls, hold up the ball, and can use his body well to shield a defender. For a RM sub I think that fits a bill
And, we're a little thin at RM with Nacho out. I had hoped Bolma would be a factor there, but haven't seen/heard anything about him since preseason.