I'm glad someone with the rep of Nutmeg posted this so that I didn't have to and get flamed for wearing Rev colored glasses. Dempsey never played Dmid before he came to the Revs and he is still learning the defensive aspect of the position but he seems to have the "bite" to play it, its just a matter of getting the game time in to get a feel for it. Overall he is a very well rounded soccer player, he can trap, control, turn, and distribute with both feet and most importantly, do it all under pressure. Working the ball under pressure is probably his greatest technical strength, he is already probably one of the top 10 players in MLS with the ball at his feet and a defender on his back, which leads me to my thoughts which Nutmug has helpfully given me the opening for sharing which is this: Consider the mid-field scheme we were playing at the start of the Hex last time around... Stewart was the right-mid (who switched sides once in a while just to keep them guessing) but he played 2/3 offense and 1/3 defense and was free to drift into space in the middle to attack the box. He was sort of an attacking-right-mid. On the other side was Cobi, who stayed wide almost all the time and played more defensively, sort of a 2/3 defense and 1/3 offense wide-left-mid. With Cobi staying back more Armas was able to slide a bit right to cover the space behind Stewart. Finally in front of Armas floating around the middle as needed to provide possession and linkup the backs to the forwards was Reyna who, despite being the "attacking mid" played deeper than Stewart. Now replace Stewart with Donavan (upgrade), Cobi with Beasley (upgrade), Armas with Pablo (upgrade if he plays like 2002/last night), and Reyna with Dempsey (assuming a year and more of continued improvement). Donavan plays the attacking-right-mid, out of the center so he is harder to match up on but with space to run into in front which I think is when he is at his best. Isolated on the right his speed and ability to break down/past a defender one-on-one is highlighted. Beasley plays the wide-left-mid. More defensive and wider than Donavon but still able to attack up the side and cut if the defense tilts the other way to stack up on Donavan. Like Stewart/Cobi Donavan and Beasly has a long time playing together and a good feel for when/how to play off each other. Pablo plays the Armas role, staying deep and playing defense and Dempsey, who's best skill is control under pressure plays the linkup role (and he is already a better shooter/finisher than Reyna when he pushes up. The key skill for the middle-man is experience, knowing when to push it up and when to pull it back and Dempsey doesn't have that yet and he would be a more aggressive middle-mid but I would love to see what happens if he got the chance. The combination play in middle picked up a LOT when he came in last night and I'd suggest it was more than just addition by subtraction. There are a number of other interesting players our there like Gaven and Martino, and lets not forget Klien as a pure right mid, he was playing powerful soccer when his knee went. JOB gets the nod if he is healthy and Reyna probably for the experience (but he would push the same formation/players into a more conservative stance) but Dempsey, IF he continues to progress, would be worth thinking about for the slot... So I'm not exactly suggesting this as the starting lineup for Germany but it has an exciting mix of skill, grit, and players seeming put in positions to play to their strengths instead of playing against type. P.S. Ursula, I'd love to see him in the "target" forward spot also, again, he control under pressure would be a key still. He play it differently than McBride but it would be interesting. He played better for the Revs the further up the field he got to play, he was an animal for the month or so he was playing forward due to injuries.
Fair point about Beasley, but I don't think we play in that formation if DMB is available. More likely, Lewis would be outwide if we were playing a diamond that emphasized width from the left and right midfielders. For the sake of argument, if DMB did play as the left wing, we're still missing a solution on the right. And not just somebody who can get wide like Ralston, but somebody who provides enough of a threat that it warrents the attention of the defense (and, thus, takes some attention off of Donovan.) We'd be playing with half to 3/4 of the field's width, instead of the full width we get with LD and DMB as dual two attacking mids. Additionally, if teams do man-mark him, we don't lose the entire middle of the attacking area when there's another player by his side. This was not intended as a slam on LD, and I'm sorry if it came off that way. He's currently out best player, and the question is how to use him best... he's arguably our number one or two option at attacking mid, center mid, right mid, forward, and striker.
Johnson played like crap. well...not total crap but he shouldve had another hat trick with all those missed chances
Whether or not Dempsey moves to the starting 11 remains to be seen. But the concept is good because it means, if it happens, there will be a goal scorer in the defensive midfield. For all that Claudio, Pablo, Zav and Armas have brought to the game, they do not have a scoring history worth much of anything. Dempsey does, just like JOB. In my view, one Nats goal should be to upgrade players in all positions to the point that goals are reliably contributed from the feet by all positions, not just the forwards and attacking midfielders. This means players with overall better footwork, ball control and on-frame shooting skills.
Once again, let's talk about Josh Wolff. Everyone says that Wolff makes excellent runs. Indeed, he is held out to be the model at making great runs. Apparently, you think he's a better finisher than Eddie Johnson, too. So ... if Wolff makes equal or better quality runs that EJ, and Wolff would finish the opportunities that EJ can't, and Wolff is also fast ... then why does Wolff score in fewer than 25% of his National team opportunity, while EJ has scored within 20 minutes of entering a game three straight times? I guess that EJ must be a lucky fellow, to be visibly worse than other forwards and yet to get so many more goals. Did you know that EJ now has more than 20% of Joe-Max Moore's career USMNT goal-scoring total (23), in less than 2% of the total playing time?
Eddie was great. He missed two chances he could have had, one in the first half when the goalie made a very good save on a ball Eddie skimmed along the ground, which will usually get under and once in the second half when his control on a slick field let him down and took him too wide, giving him no angle. He hustled all over the field, won quite a few balls in the air, which he played to teammates instead of just knocking on aimlessly, and combhined with Landon well on a few occasions. He showed great touch and control throughout the game, was only in those positions to score becuause of his excellent running, and finished very cooley on one chance. His coolness with the ball under pressure, combined with his speed, strength and ability to get into open spaces will make him vert dangerous for years to come. If we had another Donovan to sit in midfield, I'd love to see an Eddie Johnson/Landon Donovan strike partnership. Not many defenses would be able to cope well with that combination of pace, skill and strength.
This may be the primary point. Corrales' weak play hurt the team in multiple offensive ways, not to mention his stupid foul on Fuller when Fuller had a poor shooting angle and the US had support in the center of the box. But you can't really blame Corrales, since everyone doubted his viability as a starter from the get-go. I'll just assume this was a "final chance" for Corrales, like Arena's use of Stewart in Jamaica months ago. We haven't seen Stewart since, and we won't see Corrales again, either. Nutmeg's box midfield makes the most sense going into the Hex. It also seems to fit our midfield depth pretty well, in that the defensive/holding mid roles can be played well by a number of players -- Mastro, Zavagnin, O'Brien, Reyna, Armas, and now perhaps Dempsey. I like that depth, especially if the JOB and Reyna are healthy at some point. Left attacking midfield has depth with Beasley, Lewis, and Convey. Right attacking midfield has less depth, but Donovan owns it unless he gets hurt, and Gavin may be a good prospect. Plus, we now have some depth at striker - McBride, Johnson, Wolff, Casey, Ching, and maybe Mathis. That's more than adequate for the Hex. The team has 1.5 years to work things out for WC06. The attacking puzzle pieces are starting to become clearer.
There's also Convey, who I'd still rank ahead of Gaven on the depth chart at this point. Like you said, I think we're in pretty good shape on the left.
Just a question, not a challenge, can Eddie Gaven really play wide in a diamond? From what I've seen (and I've seen way more Revs than Metro games) Gavin is like Dempsey in that, he is a good player and so can play OK outside he is better in the middle with space and angles to work with all around. I would think of him in the running for the AM in the diamond or one of the two forward-mids in the box but only in a emergency as a pure wing in the diamond or 3-5-2. Also, as a pure wing he would have more defensive responsibility, would he be able to handle that and still play his game? (questions based a small sample of Metro games, I'd be interested to hear better informed opinions).
Does Bruce have some sort of absurd aversion to playing 4 midfielders that all can handle the ball, make a move to relieve pressure, and do something more creative than the obvious square pass or through ball? I guess we shouldn't be surprised that a thrown-together midfield that haven't played much together would bog down. Good game from Eddie Johnson. He keeps Wolff/Casey on the bench or off roster for first game in Hex based on this form. Eddie Gaven, please.