Well it doesn't mean anything, but still sucks to lose. Anthony Wallace, what were you thinking? And the guy flopped, there's no doubt about it.
Sala is going to line up Dello Russo and Wallace and kick some butt tonight. we should have gotten out of there with a 1-0 win. I was happy to see some of the youngsters tonight. I liked what I saw from Shea.
I'm still waiting for Brek Shea to show something positive... Tonight, all he did was lose the ball, pass the ball to the opposition, get burned, and so on... Man U can have him.
I was at the gym for most of the game, but I recorded the game on the DVR and I'm almost at the half. It's a friendly, so I don't really get too excited about the result either way, but it looks to me like the boys are playing reasonably competently and moving the ball around fairly well. If I had to make an estimate, I'd say that although the ball is being played predominantly in the midfield, with FCD getting slightly more good attacking opportunities. Toja's goal was a bit of a fluke precipitated by poor defending on the part of Chivas, but it's good to see him making the run. I suppose that there are mass substitutions in the 2nd half, but this friendly appears to be well-timed for SH to get a look at his players in real game situations against a good opponent.
Good job. Kudos to Michael "Ankle Biter" DelloRusso (spelling? who cares) and Anthony "Backpass" Wallace. Chivas fans were asleep until last 10 minutes.
BTW, it's obvious why they couldn't wear their usual colors, but the uniforms that Chivas were wearing were truly hideous. They should've borrowed Chivas USA's blue uniforms that they wear in Dallas. They're a lot easier on the eyes.
Those are the new alternate jerseys for 2008. I bet that C-USA will go that route next year. They remind me of Chelsea's alternates, and yes, they are horrible.
Fun atmosphere w the goat fans. Our subs played pretty bad imo. Shea whiffed a shot, was amazed to find the ball on his head in the box and skyed it and generally played like the rank rookie he is. Ricky muffed a one v one which would of put the game away. Chase was a waste of space. Wally? Wow that was a weak pass. We were playing against kids our own age don't forget. First half tFCD almost put together one of the nicest string of passes in the 25th minute but missed the finishing header. Beautiful to watch. Beautiful night.
Yes it was good to see some new faces and get some PT spread around. It wil be more of the normal starting XI on Tuesday as that is a real game as FCD takes the USOC seriously (as they should). You must have been watching a much different game. All he did was show he is not anywhere near ready to play in an MLS game, not unless we are up 3 goals with 15 minutes left to play. I like the kid and have visited with him and I'm sure with his pedigree and call-ups there is some real potential there, but he is very, very raw and not anywhere near ready to be a contributor. He is a 2 year developmental project right now.... but he's young so no big deal.
Wallace aint ready either. Sub Cooper for Abe and Dax for AA and the starting lineup would look very good, probably the best it can look. Serioux looked good playing higher up.
I gotta hang partial credit for Chivas' second goal on Sala. Davino looked as if he had Fabian covered well enough to force him into a bad angle to the goal. If he takes the shot early, Sala has it covered easily. If he waits, Davino can close him down and force him wide. But once Sala came out and was beaten, Fabian could take the shot right away while Davino was still a few yards away... which he did.
sucks to be Wally. I feel bad for him. I hope Schellas has decided to leave Adrian at midfield. He is the best holding/attacking option at mid when he's in there. We all saw it at the end of last season and hopefully it stays that way.
Didn't really feel like a loss. Our first team beat their first team(or at least the best they brought). Gotta agree that we are a much more dangerous side with Serioux in the midfield and I gotta say my MOTM tonight was Blake Wagner. He was absolutely fantastic out on the left all game and I can't remember one time that he got beat.
Wagner has really looked good at that left centerback spot. His passes out of that spot are usually good and he plays defense good enough to ... allow Serioux to move back into the defensive mid pool.
Minor disagreement: Wileman put in the excellent free-kick that Shea screwed up and headed over. Otherwise, yeah, not much going on there. According to the Chivas fan in the other thread, their kids have a lot more experience than the vast majority of our kids, in Copa Libertadores etc. Not really an excuse; Shea and Ricardinho had opportunities to put the game away and failed. Boomer and Pegasus, it seemed like Wagner was putting in a lot of crunching, but well-timed, slide tackles too, the kind that makes a player think twice before going up against him again. I think this is more the Wagner that showed up in Trinidad. For those watching at home, how much contact was there on the penalty?
The penalty was there, Dello Russo slid in late, made contact. I would have been pissed at the call if i were in the stadium but in TV it looked like the right call to me. The Chivas player had just beaten 2 FCD defenders, D-R was the last one to pass. As much as I HATE Michael Kennedy it seems like FCD got the share of stupid calls going our way. Strange.
Don't mean to fuss about a meaningless call, but the guy dove like Michael Phelps. There might have been contact, but you can easily see he threw his arms in the air like someone put a gun to his head. It's upsetting, because there probably would have been a penalty called even if he didn't put in that Oscar performance
This hasn't been metnioned, but I think the team looked better w/o Ricchetti. He usd to be the glue that held the team together on the field but he has looked worthless this season.
regarding that PK, it looked as if pitch was slow to react on the ball. honestly, he looked like he was lost in space not marking anyone. but davino was in decent position to stop the ball, but it skimmed off his foot/leg. then, dello came in and tripped up the attacker leading to the PK. i agree w/ some of the posts that adrian showed better quality at MF. blake showed he could definitely handle the LB position.
Im glad someone mentioned Wagner. He was awful for the first 15 minutes, but really turned it around. He was fantastic for the rest of the evening. Godo tackling, nice calmness on the ball, and excellent distribution from the back. He was absolutely my player of the game... Some other thoughts: - As I mentioned in my other thread, props to SH for moving to a true 3-5-2. Shows growth and adjustment to his personel as a coach. The defensive midfield was extremely well organized, and the team had a really nice shape to it, something that I haven't seen in years. I thought the last 30 minutes of the first half was as well as FCD have played this season. - Dello-Russo, Wallace, Shea, Chase, and Daniels aren't ready to play yet. Wallace was really disappointing for me. Shea I think showed why the coaches consider him more of a left back in a flat 4. He has a lot of growth to do at the offensive end. Could have been sent off, once again. - Nice to see AA used at outside mid. He will play the rest of the season there, I think. - Abe was awful. Nice hustle guy off the bench, but he didn't do much. - Great that SH has identified that Serioux needs to play in the midfield. He and Ricchetti will end up starting at d-mid in the 3-5-2 together. Wallace's poor performance makes it clear that Saragosa is needed for depth. - Toja was good in the first half. Still doesn't create much, but was more active and kept the ball moving. - The one young player who did some nice things was Avila. Great spin and shot towards the end just outside of the 18. He is going to be really good, I think. - Ricardinho wasn't very effective and showed why he hasn't pushed for a spot at forward. All in all, once we had Rhine and Dello-Russo on the right and Chase in the middle, I fully expected FCD to give up the league. Those guys just aren't athletic enough to play against a team like Chivas. So I am fine with the result, but really encouraged by parts of the first half.
Great game you guys, this game really benefited our players and yours, that Shea guy was good, he just needs to pass better, and the guy with the dreads was really awful, every time he got the ball, he would lose it or kick it into no where. Its true that our youngsters do have Copa Libertadores experience, because we focused more on the league than libertadores.
While it was nice to see most of the bench get emptied last night (well, nice to see until a few of them actually touched the ball, that is), I'm still confused as to the starter/substitute pattern. As in, why the hell did some of the starters play so long in a meaningless game - especially in the middle of such a compressed schedule of games? Happy that guys like Cooper and Ricchetti were not played at all, but there were a couple more who should have been in the same position. Too bad Burse wasn't available, because there was no reason for Sala to have played last night. Same for Davino. Here's a guy who - not exactly a kid in the first place - has been battling little injuries for the past few weeks and hasn't been 100%, but he goes the full 90 in a game like this? I don't get it. Only explanation I can figure is that what we saw last night is an indication of what we're getting for the USOC game tomorrow - and I don't think that's necessarily a positive. The way I'm reading it is that the plan was to give some of the young guys just enough of a run to give them a taste, while not giving them too much because they're getting the start on Tuesday. FCD's hand now may be somewhat forced in that direction due to all of the injuries (see the update on the FCD blog), but I don't know if that's the best way to go against Miami. And, on that note, is that why Dax was the only player of significance who didn't get off the bench last night? Does that mean he's starting tomorrow? Who played last night and for how long, plus the longer-than-expected injury list, really seems to complicate the lineup for Miami. After writing in Burse (most likely) and Cooper (hopefully), who else gets the start? Hopefully Dax. I'm not sure I'm looking forward to seeing Pitch center a back three in front of Burse, especially since Wagner, Moor, and Serioux all played significant minutes last night. Who plays with him? Tomorrow should be interesting. Just not sure it's gonna be good interesting.
I think we should just be happy he hasn't tried to bring a substituted player back onto the field like they do in college.
Not sure, but I think that the Open Cup has some funny rules about the amount of internationals you can have playing. Perfect game last night for Schellas to continue his "evaluation" process. I think we all learned loads about who is and who is not ready for senior side duty. Forgive me for repeating a couple of things that you guys already pointed out, but: *Wagner looks like a better option at left back than Serioux Serioux looked like a better option at defensive mid than Saragosa. Serioux/Ricchetti could be a pretty mean tandem *This team was built to play 3-5-3. Either blow up the team, or ride it out this year. *Toja can't play w/ his back to pressure. However, when he makes those blindside runs to either sideline, he vacates space for other players to exploit, and he can be very effective receving and penetrating on the sideline. *Oduro is making huge strides at becoming a very good MLS forward. All he lacks is the finishing, at it will come. * Out of respect towards himself and his reputation as a fan favorite, should we ever put Bobby out on the field again? Two outings show that he really is as old as he is. * Did you notice how pissy Sala seemed from beginning to end of the game? The TF guys commented on it, and it was pretty obvious. Even though Chivas didn't start 4 of their main guns, I thought this was a productive game for us. Schellas gets his first non-district game to size up the bench. And boy, did we all learn a lot tonight. I think that if we were going for the win, we get it. But, more important objectives were accomplished.