I could see that, and I'd think Nicol would be comfortable with Joe playing in the middle. Then again, didn't Riley play alongside Parkhurst in central defense at Wake Forest? If that's the case, how about: GK: Reis RB: Heaps CB: Parkhurst CB: Riley LB: Franchino RM: Latham DM: Dorman CM: Cancela LM: Leonard FW: Twellman FW: Smith My concern here would be the inexperience and lack of size in the middle... not that Franchino brings much in the way of the latter to the table, but he's more experience, and a bit more disciplined from a defensive standpoint that Riley. Thoughts?
Either... GK: Reis RB: Heaps CB: Parkhurst LB: Leonard DM: Franchino DM: Dorman RM: Riley LM: Gilberto AM: Cancela ST: Twellman ST: Smith ...Or... GK: Reis RB: Heaps CB: Parkhurst LB: Leonard DM: Franchino DM: Dorman RM: Latham LM: Riley AM: Cancela ST: Twellman ST: Smith
I'm hoping my neighbors aren't too pissed off about some jerk (oh wait that was me!) screaming his lungs off at 12:10am. Twellman didn't look as bad as some are making out ... but I really wish he had finished the breakaway How many times did both teams just pass to their counterparts? Ugly game in many regards. Parkhurst with a huge flub in the second half, just passing the ball away just outside the box. Terrible marking on their goal. For a change, Cobi didn't kill us. Leonard beat the first man a few times last night 1v1, but then decided to take on a second way too often. Riley wasn't good. Reis was solid. He seemed a bit out of position on the goal, but I didn't see a good camera angle to really judge. Tough yellow on Joseph. That hurts even more for Saturday night (think we could use the depth that Cassio would have provided?). Not sure what LA was bitchin' about, but they wasted 30 seconds of the first minute of extra time, and the goal wasn't offside. Kennedy did a good job there. I'll take it, but we're in trouble if we play like this on Saturday.
I'll try my hand at predicting a starting XI vs. Chicago: GK: Reis RB: Heaps CB: Parkhurst LB: Franchino DM: Gilberto Flores DM: Dorman RM: Riley LM: Leonard AM: Cancela ST: Twellman ST: Edozien Shouldn't we hope Edozien starts simply for the fact that playing with Smith up front is like starting the game with ten men? I thought I read Flores was a DM with the Mutts, and furthermore that he was brought in specifically to add depth at that position. That's why I have him there. If I am mistaken, then Leonard (RB), Joey (DM), and Latham (RM) start. The bench is a ghost town, so The Rev will play "savage!" (no substitutions )
The problem I see is that both Smith and Edozien look better as subs than as starters. Riley seems to have had the same problem since he came back from injury, so I'm going to hope they're still kind of green.
Watching Leondard run up the left side with pace only to flub the final ball in made me think that Winston Griffiths was out there or something. And for as good as Reis has been for us, and absolutely no doubt the defense blew coverage on the goal, I would have liked to see him bail us out, as Hartman had on those two Twellman chances. Make no mistake, I like Reis a lot, and he'll oftentimes make the save to bail out his defense. This just wasn't one of those times. We are in deep ******** with Joseph out next match.
What is it about our left wing? Last night, when they showed our first ever goal in LA (John Kerr), the pass started with Welton. Welton and Griffiths were the prototype -- "I've got a little skill. Watch me use it to give the ball to the other team." Leonard seemed to have caught the same disease. Seems like only Chronopoulos and Kamler have been immune.
OK...I haven't seen this in line-up form...but it would put people on the field who have played these positions at some time this season with the Revs. Also ignores what Gilberto might bring.... --------------Reis Heaps -----Parkhurst------Leonard Riley ---Dorman--Franchino ----Smith ------------Cancela ----Twellman----Edozien I just can't see SN having Parkhurst, Riley and Dorman in our central defensive area with Cancela in front of them. Question is whether SN thinks Smith or Latham provides the better matchups on the left side. No matter how you look at it we are getting pretty thin at this point...but that is what happens when you lose four stars/starters plus one first line sub/potential starter. First off the bench would be Gilberto or Latham if we need defense or fresh legs. First off would be Smith and then Cancela...especially if we have a lead in the 70th minute.
P.S. The other reason to start Smith is that we need someone to mark Jacqua on set pieces...without Dempsey or Joseph, we have lost quite a bit of height .... Not saying that Khano has proven himself tough enough to fight his way through traffic, but he needs to step up...
Honestly, there was a bit of "flubbing" going on because both Twellman and Smith made exactly the same crap runs, or no runs at all to support. I'd even go so far as to say that Leonard was one of the few who made positive moves at all. Twice I saw an end line run get thwarted by lack of targets. One of those runs should have resulted in a goal, but, both strikers were sitting in the hole waiting for someone else to make a dangerous run to pull off the defense. Leonard was fine, but, he had no support. He kept looking to pass but everyone ran away from him to get in scoring position. Most of the game I was hoping that Leonard would get the ball because eveyone else was such crap. Riley crawled under a rock most of the time to avoid being exposed and took away any threat from the right by doing so. Even Heaps was trying to make positive forays to get some spark going. Shalrie an Cancela completed more passes to Gals than to us and just killed our momentum time and again. It was the theme of the night. Luckily, it all ended with some action. If they would only play like they were down a goal from the opening whistle, it would be a blow-out, and, a lot more fun to watch.
From my perspective, I thought you guys were dangerous the whole game. Going into it, I was certain that LA would have tons of possession but not get anything for it and that you guys were going to get a late goal from Taylor to win it. Yeah, it was obvious that both teams were missing players, but that game showed me who has composure and who doesn't. LA still had Pando and Cobi, and Grabavoy was having a monster game for a player in his position. They should have had the talent to find the kinks in the armor and exploit them. But they didn't. And The Rev almost did. LA's Entitlement Complex is going to be their downfall. NE's lack of one is what makes them great. I'm getting more and more amped for the 16th. BTW, sorry Nicol got the shaft on the AS game, but the rules are the rules. If it had been on PPG, I wouldn't be b!tc#ing, but it is straight points and so your guy is unfortunately out. And considering all the road games we played (even though many of them were against expansion teams), I don't think it is an unfair result.
Kevin, the Revs have only played two fewer road games than FCD. Hell, once the Revs play their next game, we'll have played just one fewer road game in the same number of games (15). The road game thing just doesn't matter (especially when you count what you mentioned ... three games at the expansion teams). Yes, the rules are the rules. I just think (as do many others here) that this rule is wrong. It should be PPG, and then we go from there. Again ... I'll repeat what I've posted a few times recently. If the Fire had won one of their losses from earlier this year, and wound up having their coaching staff in because they had played 4 more games than the Revs by July 4th and 3 more than FCD ... would that have been fair?
I think we fans care about this a lot more than the coaches do. They'd probably just as soon have a light week in the middle of summer.
I don't disagree with you about the Chicago point - more than a game is unfair. But over 16 games? Who would have thought the top two teams would be that tight? Like I said - if the rule had been PPG, I would not have thought that unfair.
Maybe I'm reading these all star coach comments wrong, but it seems people are saying it's not Nicol and the Rev staff, when it is. The announcers on the Rev game last night confirmed that it would be the Rev staff if they tied or won. Calculation is based on points earned per game. Nicol = 32/15 = 2.133 FC Dallas staff = 34/16 = 2.125. Rev coaches are in.
That is incorrect. See the MLS press release. Our complaint is that it's not done by Points per game, and so Nicol got the shaft since his team had played one less game.
I must have been watching a different game as there was no comparison of these two players. Tnt, coming off injury & somewhere less than 100%, was head & shoulders above Smith. Granted when your touch is a little off chipping the keeper might be a bad choice. Even so he had 2 good headers: 1 on-goal which reqd. a good save from Hartman and the other led to the tying goal, and his work rate coming back from injury was pretty good as the last header was in stoppage time. I again thought Shalrie had a good match and worked hard all night. I felt like he was responsible for the Revs. having as much possession as they did. He also was still working hard in stoppage time as he got an assist on the leveling goal if I'm not mistaken. We'll probably get an idea of what he brings to the table for the Revs. since he won't be able to play against Chicago. Maybe I'm overestimating him and The Revs. won't miss him?
Nicol's team has performed better, and has played against stiffer competition. Besides the 3 games away to Expansion teams, Dallas has also played Colorado away twice, taken 6 points off them. (Colorado have a whopping 17 pts in 17 games.) Fully half of their away matches have been at 2nd-tier teams. That aside, and all else being equal, I'd give you even money Nicol and his staff didn't even want to be bothered with coaching this game. On the day, he'll be praying like the rest of us that his players don't get banged up.
Agreed ... he will be missed big time on Saturday. I bet we will see more ball movement up the middle by an opponent than we have all year. Now to this issue, I agree wholeheartedly when it comes to our coaching staff. They'll be sitting there happily drinking a few pints, and keeping their fingers crossed that no one's hurt.
Best result of the match for me was TnT got through it without popping his hamstring. I thought for sure something bad would happen as he pushed for the 90 minutes. Joseph stepped up big time last night. Tough break on the yellow card. Amazing number of misdirected passes from both teams. Sometimes I couldn't even tell who the pass was intended for. I thought Smith continued to look lost on the field. He just doesn't seem to have something he does well. Seems to have mastered getting to the ball just after someone else does. WCQs I get. Incomprehensible that we lose so many players for a month in the middle of the season for something called a Gold Cup.
Alright, let's go ahead and get all this on the table. Let's to a complete breakdown just so we have it all in one place. Let's talk just about the home record for a moment? We've played six, you've played seven. We beat Chicago (no slouch) and LA (at least they had Donovan) in addition to CDC, Real and Colorado. We were tied by San Jose. NE, otoh, beat DC (no slouch), Chicago (no slouch), and Metro (depending on the team that shows up...), in addition to beating CDC and CB. Then again, NE was tied by both Colorado and KC at home. The Rapids - who at that time were dogmeat? Any edge you had on possible strength of schedule goes out the window with that tie. Oh, that and the game in hand. (I would compare the Chicago games as comperable, and KC to SJ and DC to LA - leaving the positive of beating Metro along with the negative of tying the Rapids. Considering how Metro has played of late, I'm not sure how to gague that - I mean, they were tied by Real yesterday after being up a player and a goal at the half.) The road then, shall we? We've played ten, you've played eight. (For the moment, I'm going to set aside the two other road games against Chivas. I consider Real and Columbus to be relatively the same. I consider KC, Colorado, DC, Metro, SJ and LA to be similar, with Chicago at the head of that pack and Colorado at the back. Of late, the Rapids have been playing better - mostly due to the trade for Petke and the health of Jeff Cunningham.) We both tied San Jose. (even) You've beaten Columbus, we've beaten Real. (even) We both beat DC. (even) You lost in DC, we lost in Chicago. (even) We tied the Rapids, you tied Metro. (even - at the times those games were played, those teams were relatively even in terms of place. Note that before your game with Metro, they had tied Real, lost to Chicago at home, lost to San Jose at home, and were about to lose to Kansas City.) Now after that, we start to get some separation. We lost in LA, you tied. (adv Revs) We tied in KC, you won. (adv Rev) The remaining games are your win over Chicago and our win over the Rapids - not *exactly* even. (adv Rev - but mostly because of strength of schedule by a *bit* - remember this is the Rapids team that beat KC while down a man, the Rapids side that when we beat them had Petke and Cunningham.) So that set of six games gives NE an edge. Is that separation made up by the road games against Chivas? Considering the scare you had when they came to town, I think it is safe to say that even against Chivas, nothing is automatic. Consider the 1-0 win Chicago had over the weekend - that wasn't a real convincing win. KC tied them when they were there. And San Jose has had trouble beating them. So I don't think you can just dismiss those games out of hand. But I can't in good conscience say that those two road games *clearly* overcome the three slight advantages you have in the road setup (two losses v. two ties and wins in Chicago v. Colorado). It sure is close, though. Especially considering that two more games on the road is two more games on the road. If it had been two more home games, I would be much more willing to agree with the original post quoted above. As it stands now, though, I don't think you can clearly say one is above the other - there surely are arguments for both sides, but I can't make a convincing argument that Clarke is *clearly* better than Nicol, or vice versa. Not based on the facts, anyways. For the record, NE is still No. 1 in my rankings (should be published tomorrow) based on the better results both going into this week and this weekend. Whereas last week it was based on style points (ugh), this week was relatively easy since NE tied on the road and Dallas tied at home. Not enough separation that a loss by NE to Chicago won't put Dallas back on top. As we've said before, I guess this one will be decided on the pitch. July 16th is a little under two weeks away. It will be very interesting to see.
I Didn't get a chance to see the game until this morning on the web cast. First of all I share Doc's opinion that this team is very special to get points the way we do or we are just a very lazy team I think our Defense played very well all night and looked very organized. Is it just me or does having Joey on the field make are our backline more composed and organized (minus the last DC game). It would seam to me that is why Joey plays over Avery. I think the man of the match was Parkhurt or Dorman don't know which one was better. So much for Parkhurt's "rookie wall" I think this was one of his best games this year. I don't think the goal was his fault, it looked like that run came out of the midfield and should have been pick up before hand. Plus, it was behind him anyways so he never saw it. Dorman overall had a pretty good game with a clutch goal. With regards to Marshall I noticed he was getting a double team on the outside a lot and he was trying to take them on 1 v 2 a lot. He was actually showing some good skill too, but the double team got the best of him most of the time. He may have been trying to take them on because has REV-WEST said he was not getting any supporting runs from his teammates and was trying to make something happen himself. The reason for the double may have more to do with the fact that the Gals may have been trying to shut down are flanks because with Dempsey gone form the attack and only TnT up top we are basically a one legged house up the middle if the flanks can be shut down. Also, I noticed the Revs where playing with a four man back line a lot last night. Smart move by SN I think we have been very vulnerable on our flanks all season and on that field with their flank players that could have made for a deadly attack all night and made the difference in the game.