Did anybody notice that this message was posted at 10:46 AM yesterday? Almost 8 hours before the game started.
Re: How many games do we have to lost.... What exactly are you blaming Kinnear for? That was not a game thrown away by the coach.
Re: How many games do we have to lost.... Damn, You are harsh. Remember De Rosario (one of the most creative players in the team) did not play on the last game neither the end of the previous one. Give the team a break.
Re: How many games do we have to lost.... come on!!!!!! its only 3 games into the season. We will turn this around this weekend coming up we will beat Salt Lake and then we will go up to Colorado and take it from them we will be 3-2 coming home to play Dallas.
Here are some game reports: The Houston Chronicle report was posted on the previous page, and includes a slide gallery and lots of notes at the bottom re Robinson, Waibel, etc. Washington Post: United Makes the Most of Its Opportunities Washington Times: Gros bolsters D.C. United MLSnet.com: Dynamo's D.C. trip ends in defeat
Re: What happened to Eddie Robinson... I actually consider it good news that Robinson is not further injured, as that would keep him out longer. If he did something to upset Dom, at least that means he can play when Dom is ready to have him play. This is the first time I remember Dom benching a player for disciplinary reasons; not that Dom is a pushover, just that this has not come up before. Dom is very, VERY focused on guys being team players, supporting each other, that kind of thing. So, it's not that hard to envision him making a point if Robinson did something that Dom perceived as detrimental to the team.
From the Houston Chron: Dom needs to go back and look at the beginning of last year. Before everyone panics about the defense, here are the stats from last year: The Earthquakes were 1-1-3 in their first 5 games in April. They gave up 11 goals in 5 games; they gave up 7 goals in their first 3 games (2 at home, 1 on the road, the exact same schedule as this year). So, they have actually given up 1 less goal in the first 3 games than they did last year. San Jose's defense consisted of Waibel, Dayak, Robinson, and Barrett, with Onstad in goal. While they had not played together before as an intact group, some of them had played with each other. In May, Dayak and Waibel went down with injuries, Gray was traded for and Califf came off his injury and was ready to play (late in May). Barrett started the season off horrendously - he probably made more passes to the other team than San Jose in the first month. It was so bad that in an online weekly article, he made a joke about knowing what color uniforms his team was wearing. In spite of this, the team gelled in May/June and went on to have the best goals allowed average in MLS. While the backline returned 3 of the 4 starters, Robinson has not been playing, Barrett has not been playing defense, and Serioux is brand new. So you could argue that the new faces in the starting backline this year are about the same number as last year (Gray is the only returning starting defender who has started all 3 games). Let's get Barrett back in at left back, get Robinson back in there (hopefully whatever he did to upset Dom will be quickly forgiven), get Serioux playing next to Robinson, and then let Waibel and Gray fight for the Right Back spot. I actually think this defense could be better than last year's, Serioux is much more athletic than Califf, we just need him to take charge and run the defense like Califf did.
The two goals scored came from two mistakes. In the first one, Cochrane had the wrong position on man to man with Joshua Gros. He tried to be in front of him facing the ball, when he should have been goal side of Gros and facing the front or the opposite end with an eye on the corner. This stance avoids defenders from getting caught ball watching. In the second, the keeper, Pat Onstad was distracted when Serioux all of a sudden left the 10 yd line on a free kick, to protect the near corner of goal. This was a bad move. The free kick would not have happened in the first place if Cochrane instead of diving at Adu just jockeyed with him and stayed with him. Diving to tackle in front of the 18 yard is not a good choice. MLS teams unlike other leagues are very balanced. Yes other top leagues have three or four top teams that compete, and typically they are the wealthiest and can afford good players and good coaches. So, the MLS games boil down to a game of strategies. A visiting team typically plays defensively with the object of wearing the other team down. Much like Mohammad Ali's rope-a-dope in the early rounds. In order to do that in soccer you have to have a very cohesive defense. Houston has good individuals in its defense but they are disconnected. The keeper and the defenders need to communicate; especially the keeper has to be more vocal in calling the defenders to their positions. Successful teams always have a leader in the three primary areas - defense, mid-field and attack. Of course, DiRosario dictates from the mid-field, Ching seems to dominate the forward position and Serioux seems to be the go to person in defense. With DiRosario out, as a result the whole team was out of sync. Repeatedly services to the forwards landed right into the hands of the keeper. Even corner kicks went directly to the keeper. Typically, most of these kicks should always be out of the keepers range. And forwards should be positioned to run into the ball. Therefore they need to be far enough away from the keeper to make their run to a spot and beat the keeper. This is something that the team needs to work on. However if one sends a floating kick the keeper will find a way to get to the ball. The kick should be more direct and instead of feeding the ball directly from a long kick into the 18 yd box it should be fed away from the box either on the two wings or in front of it. My two cents! Again, Houston is a good team and they will play with many different strategies and hopefully find some that suits them well – at home and away.
Actually, the defense I watched last evening was fairly effective except on the the set plays. Frankly, the last goal was an excellent strike; the corner that produced the first goal was a fine driven ball that bounced right. Our corners were often outswingers that the goalie handled in the air. I agree that these should be driven balls or at least inswingers that challenge the goalie to make a decision. Without DeRosario, our offense was handicapped. Mullan just did not get free rein on the wing, and Davis played almost centrally and just did not make himself a target very often. So we did play over the top often, and DC shortened the field so that it was tough to get the ball over to the forwards without chipping to the goalie. That said, we did have many chances that missed. DC played this way exactly last year; jam up the midfield and challenge us to play over the top. It has worked twice in a row. I think that Dwayne would have made that strategy more difficult to employ; that said, if we had done better on corners and on our chances, the result would have been different. Adu was no factor at all until we had to open up and attack relentlessly. That said, he is a handful in the open field.
Biggest problem houston has is that they dont have a forward who can stretch the defense vertically or horizontally. Moreno tries, but hes just not fast enough. The way DC crowds the midfield, they can be attacked over the top. It didnt help that Davis clearly wasnt fully fit, DeRo was out... the team needs to improve but its nothing to freak out about.
Preliminary thoughts (I've only watched up to the first goal so far, and will revise this evening after watching the rest): The defense was incredibly passive, and by defense I mean team defense, from front to back. I know the announcers were playing it off as us staying back and looking to counter, but I've watched 30 minutes of very few hard tackles. I think Ching and Serioux are the only people who tackled the first 30 minutes hard, and, surprise, when it happened, they got the ball going the other way in a dangerous fashion, particularly Ching's steal. You might be able to hang back if you were disciplined and effective, but on the first goal Gray manages to still get beat around the corner at the endline. He fouls the guy, the free kick is taken, there's a loose ball within a few feet of Gray, and the ball gets poked in. At a certain point Kinnear needs to get someone with some footwork and speed at right back. You can make excuses or comparisons about it, but 6 goals allowed in 3 games is shaky. They are giving up two goals a game, literally, regardless of opposition. Someone was saying they were playing longball. That's not my initial impression. Maybe at the end. At least from the first 30, they were "pinballing" the ball around with short passes. However, we didn't have a Preki-type guy who could take the ball in that close space and beat people. So it just amounts to endless, risky short passing. There is such a thing as having too many finesse players on the field at one time, especially when it appears that the team lacked vertical options (as in, say, the Colorado game, where we seemed able to break out quicker). The only guy to me who looked scary to DC was Serioux, who, aha, is athletic. It appeared as though DC was well prepared for the corner and throw-in threat we pose. Perkins was getting off his line quick. If people clamp down on that you are going to have to show people something else.
The history lesson might be more compelling if we were tying (last year) rather than losing (this year). One point is better than none, and, when the goals allowed were being racked up before, it was at least in service of 2-2 or 3-3 draws. There is plenty of time to turn it around, but there is no apparent cavalry coming to help. DeRo was merely suspended for one game and most of the rest of the acknowledged cast of characters are in uniform and have been since day 1. If the Yao or T-Mac equivalent, ie, Califf, were on his way back, your (adopted) case would be more convincing. I don't know if we have allocations left, but we could use one. This team needs a burner or a middie with exceptional foot skills like an Adu. The goals are being given very cheaply. That's what worries me.
So you either go over the top, or you wait until some of those 5 middies get itchy and move up out of position, and then work combinations. My feeling was that they lacked a vertical attack (and by that, I mean over the top and not just to Ching as a postup) and were impatient with the ball. If they're sitting back, you can sit back, too. No need to force the ball. They can't score if they don't have it.
I don't think Gray is all that slow and that his footwork is all that bad, but he tends to mark a bit loosely. He's not all that great a defender, and he hasn't really been compensating well with his offensive skills. So in the interest of getting the best 11 on the field (sorry, homey!), I would put Clark at right back, move Serioux to d-mid and play Waibel and Robinson at center back. That would put more bite into the defense and move Serioux up to what I presume is his natural position. Rico played some right back for the Quakes last season, and played very well there. He worked his way back to starting d-mid with his performances there. And I think Waibel is an upgrade over Cochrane at center back at this point just due to experience and toughness.
My impression on Gray is that he is out there because Kinnear has an affection for tall players to deal with high balls and for the set pieces, as well as that Gray is usually comfortable with the ball at his feet (when not pressured) and has a decent leg for playing long balls. However, he seems to lack the quickness/speed necessary for a wing defender. On, say, the play that caused the free kick, he had the endline right there as his pal and yet allowed the attacker to get around the corner on him. He then panic-tackled the dude. One can get away with some loose marking if they are quick in reacting to the ball and have the physical and mental tools to recover (what is often referred to as "recovery speed"). You have to be good at adjusting to the play, or fast like Wynne (Red Bulls), or something like that. Gray lacks one of those qualities. He strikes me as a Conrad-esque central defender playing out of position. If you want height in the back, play him in the middle. Put someone with speed or at least quickness on the wing. I lack the week-in, week-out understanding that some people on here have of the team such that I can offer good replacements. Maybe Serioux or Mullan. Someone with physical ability. However, if you stick the Canadian on the wing you are limiting his full field value and turning him into a one-side guy, which would be a shame for one of the more effective guys on the team thus far.
Is our first-round draft pick Ianni a central defender or right/left side? Is he good enough to give him a try in Gray's place? Seems it might be an option, but obviously Dom knows best about this situation and I'm confident he'll work it out. Anyone have any footage of Ianna playing in college? Anyone ever see him play enough to know how good he is/what type of back he was?
Yeah, from what I've seen Serioux has already established himself as one of the best players on the team. As good as Rico Clark is, I think Serioux might be even better. So I would play Serioux at d-mid and move Clark to right back. Clark is fairly quick and athletic. He'd be a very good right back.
UCLA describes him as a M, and I found box scores which indicated that. But, he made All-Region as a D. The U-20s refer to him as a D/M. If you look at the stuff about the Youth World Championships, he started every game on D, alongside Wynne, Spector, Sturgis, et al. He hurt his knee in the preseason, if I recall right. Not sure how severe and/or what prognosis is.
Yes, correct, I wanted to put this in my recapping earlier but forgot. At the moment there are problems with comunincation and flow, but those are coaching points that Dom can work with. This will be addressed and the team jelled around it. Thanks for putting it in.
The big change from the first couple of games last year and the rest of the season was the addition of Danny Califf. He was able to really organize and lead the defense...a trait that is missing now. Scoring goals will not be a problem (DeRo, Ching, Mullan, Davis, Clark, even Moreno), but stopping them may be an issue if the defense doesn't jell quickly. Keep in mind that Robinson may assist in this when he gets back...
The defense was soft for the first 30, solid in the mid 30, then just plain tired the last 30. Houston was strong when they played aggressive midfield and forward defense. They were pretty good also playing down the wings and hitting diagonal balls and crosses. The service was hit and miss from the wings....a lot of balls to Perkins, who seemed to have seen the video of our past two games. Houston stunk early, when they seemed obsessed with pingpong soccer. By the time they got away from that, it was 1-0. Moreno might have scored that one random goal in the first game, but he didn't show much Saturday. He almost seems like the same style as Ching, which could be bad. A speed guy might be a good idea. Do we have any fast forwards? It might have helped us break out a little. Waibel was more solid than Gray on Moreno. I don't get why it took a half-plus to make that change. Waibel ain't as smooth and silky, but he got the basic job done in the back, and that's preferable. If you go back and watch the play leading to the first goal, not only did Gray get beat around the corner, he, with no apparent explanation, let the ball go over his head to get to that point. Clark showed very little. Cerritos looked better, although he missed a hatful of chances. The "organizational" issues seemed to be in the MF, as they have been for 3 games (just outside the box, where the FK was given up....which ought to remind people of previous games). Kinnear did not seem to react to the basic fact that Adu and Moreno were causing all the problems for us. it took him a long time to get Gray off Moreno, and he never did get Adu under wraps. Considering we have a Serioux and some solid defenders, these should not be game-long puzzles.