Man what a goal by O'brien! And then an equally spectacular meltdown on D to let Ruiz equalize. Way to overrun the ball Broome. Our possession game was shite with all the giveaways bad passes but I guess not having Pareja is going to contribute to that. Suarez needs a different hair solution because he is starting to look like Deering which is not a good thing. Countess injured already? Vaca looked outstanding today, and I really liked Jeffries liberal substitution to get Johnson, Stone, and Davis in the game. All of them looked good if a little disorganized. Did mention that Rhine was crap? Oh, 1-1 by the way.
I think it was pretty good for the first game. We should have burried them but we couldn't finish. I HATE RUIZ!!!!!!!!!!!! How many times are ref.s gonna fall for his crap? O'Brien was great, its good to know we have a good replacement for Pareja. Ruiz goal was such a d mistake, lucky punk. Oh well we'll kick the Revs ass in 2 weeks.
I thought the midfield was great. how many times did we manage to keep stringing passes upfield while LA ran around toepoking at the ball? a lot, which was good. i really think if LA didn't have ruiz they wouldn't even be a contender; they were crap the first half for sure, just like in Columbus. wish we had that "impact" forward, it was too bad that we dominated a lot of the game without scoring enough to win. i yelled at rhine a lot. EJ shoulda come on earlier to at least get some playing time, it's not like rhine was doing much. O'brien in midfield?? who saw that coming? and we all thought Jeffries was too chicken to take some risks this season! let's hope he keeps it up. 2 long weeks til the next game!
Pretty disappointing result. Should've walked away with three points given our play. The midfield looked great and it was a bit of a surprise to see O'Brien in central midfield, but it turned out to be a very pleasant one. Save for the enormous meltdown in the back four, I thought we looked quite solid and I'm immediately liking the rightside switch between T-Bone and Suarez. DJ looked good, robbing Cobi late, but I think red lights might be going off on whether he is injury prone. Up front left something to be desired. Besides setting up RoB on the goal, both Kreis and Rhine looked awfully sluggish, especially Rhine. EJ came on and energized play and considering Rhine's performance, I think EJ deserves a start next week. Especially because for the short-time they played together, it looked like he and Kreis had some good chemistry.
The game proved that EJ should start. Even though in my opinion his lack of playing time showed, he physical attributes -- standing alone -- especially on this undersized team, warrant his starting from here on out. When Cerritos comes back Cerritos and Kries should battle for the second spot. I thought Jeffries waited at least 10 minutes too long to start his substitutions. So my pleasant surprise at the choices he made was undercut by the delay. Apart from one bad touch at the beginning, I thought Stone looked very good as well.
My thoughts: Midfield: Did a great job. ROB was the attacking midfield and Deering went forward when needed, but also played a tough DMF. Vaca and martinez did well on the outside even if they looked like circus midgits compared to the LA D. Back Four: Were solid for the most part. LA's goal was a fluke and from the south side stands, it looked like ruiz had used a hand to knock someone down. More on that in a minute. However the did do a good job shutting fat fish down. Forwards: Had its moments of the good, bad, and ugly. Unlucky on several shots. The Davis/EJ connection was not a bad move and there were sparks of two young players who were able to mix it up. Keeper: DJ did a great job and so did Cassar when he came in. The keepers kept the game from being lost when LA had shots that were dangerous. The lone goal was not DJ's fault considering ruiz was 5 feet away and at point blank range. ruiz shouldn't be playing in the mls. he should be on broadway. Man of the match: Burn Defense+keepers-kept the game from being a lose and held ruiz to a fluke goal. Villian of the match: ruiz for his acting. he would have been gone if I was ref(yes I am bias) and the head referee for believing ruiz as well as being an idiot who missed alot of calls. The rugrats who would rather be running around and kept getting in my way every time I wanted to take a picture. I'll try to get them developed asap.
I couldn't agree with you more. Rhine was essentially useless, and Kreis was OK I reckon. I get a little disappointed that we try to run everything through the wings all the time--we had 1 attack through the center that someone was offsides on. I mean are we really going to beat Califf and Lalas with a cross through the air? That's just fecking idiotic to me. Those two guys are basically statues out there who are good in the air. Penetrating dribble or combination through the middle, HELLO! I felt we had the better of the play and that Ruiz's goal was flukish. The problem is that he's going to be LA's trump card all year long---give him an open look, and it's going to be a goal 9 out of 10 times. We really need EJ to be healthy and step up this year, just so we can add more variation to the attack.
Since you guys were at the game, I'll give a third-party impression of the Ruiz goal. He was undercutting Morrow a bit as he went up for the header, boxing out like an NBA power forward back when anyone cared about fundamentals, but then Suarez (I think, coulda been Deering) sorta plowed into both of them, which most likely rendered Ruiz's contact incidental in the grand scheme of things. Nothing controversial on getting by Broome, as far as I could tell, just poor defending. Later, COZ "The drums must never stop. Because then it's time for the bass solo."
I think Morrow expected Ruiz to dive and therefore backed off a bit and held out his arms to show the ref in advance that no contact was made.
That fecking play changed the whole complexion of the game. We were kicking their ass up until that point. We can't have those kinds of lapses if we want to go one better this year!
Well lets try to add a positive spin here. Better now instead of the playoffs. Yes it was stupid, but trying to be open minded here.
We generally outplayed LA, but they seem to get points in a lot of matches were the other team looks better. They have lots of defensive guys who guard the goal and then feed Ruiz and Cobi whenever possible. Its pretty ugly but gets results.
exactly, remember this is the first game, the game we usually lose and Ruiz is a little piece of crap that falls on grass (did you see that?) and gets a call. I consistently told him he sucked, you know who I am now if you were near me, I'm sorry if I annoyed you. It was a fluke goal and we'll learn from our mistake, but I don't think L.A. is so dangerous as everyone makes them out to be Burn 1 Carlos Ruiz 1
you're right, but carlos ruiz is dangerous. all LA has to do is stand around most of the game and punt it up to Ruiz on countering chances. unfortunately it works, too bad for teams like us and columbus who try to CREATE and play enterprising soccer..
Fluke goal? No way. Ruiz' speciality is taking advantage of defensive lapses to score "ugly" or "lucky" goals. I agree his theatrics are irritating, but the guy's one hell of a finisher.
Yes, but his finish, as usual, was clinical. Put most any MLS forward in that position and more than half the time they'd either shoot the ball wide or into the keeper. Ruiz, though, puts away chances like that 80 or 90% of the time.
oh no doubt about that part, he is a great finisher, but he shouldn't have been in the position to finish. Thank god Cobi isn't as good of a finisher
For sure. When I first saw that breakaway, I thought it was Ruiz and yelled "Oh, no!!"; but once I realized it was just Cobi, it was "Phew, what a relief!"