I’m sure that there are people who can find a silver lining in this game…something perhaps about the energy level of the RSL attack near the end of the game perhaps…
I on the other hand am baffled by the level of disorganization apparent in RSL’s play. I expected this game to have a relatively experimental line-up. Given the ineligibility of starters Alecko Eskandarian and Medhi Ballouchy, along with the absence of leading scorer (wow, it hurts just to type that) Chris Brown to injury and Freddy Adu, and newly acquired defender/midfielder Nate Sturgis to U20 national duty, RSL clearly was going to need a tweaked line-up. Having just acquired defender Chris Wingert from Colorado, RSL still had some options to work with.
A seemingly perpetually shaky defensive line, combined with recent upheaval in the midfield certainly caused me some concern, but then, playing away and with surprisingly little expectation for a result from fans and press at home, this game seemed like a good opportunity to see what kind of effort and skill some of our reserve players were willing to show on the main squad. In retrospect, perhaps I should have expected something like the line-up we saw last night, but it was far from the line-up I was hoping to see.
Had I chosen, I would have fielded this…
Rimando
Forko Pope Torres Wingert
Harris Talley Williams Jimenez
Watson Findley
Instead, Kreis fielded…
Rimando
Lancos Pope Torres Kotschau
Kipre Harris Talley Wingert (Watson 46)
Findley (Cutler 69) K.Brown (Williams 46).
So what can we say from Kreis’ line-up choices? Clearly Kreis was hoping to bolster the defense by playing faster defenders at midfield to support our outside backs. Defensive minded midfielders are more likely to drop back to support in defensive coverage, one of the more common failings RSL has seen over the past few weeks. In fairness, Kipre ran end to end so often I had to wonder who in the hell was playing right back for a good portion of the game, since it seemed to be Kipre. Lancos was so constantly out of position, I was constantly trying to determine where he thought his defensive responsibilities were. Kotschau drifted inside so often that he completely lost track of the outside and was burnt repeatedly on dishes from the center and even cross-field switches. Defensive marking responsibilities were woeful through most of the game, and the horrific defensive pursuit angle which Torres took to cut off Johnson’s goal was disgraceful, and to add insult to injury, rather than hustling back to cut off a rebound, Kotschau, merely jogged back watching the trauma unfold. In fact, Kotschau, who was often late to challenge often chose to watch Rimando save a shot attempt than to even make an attempt to cut off part of the shooters angle. from my perspective, Kotschau should’ve been riding pine early in this game…rather than add to the strength of the defensive center, or to hold strong on the outside, Kotschau merely contributed to the general defensive confusion and clusterf**ck that defined our defense through much of the game. He appeared listless and confused for fully half of the game. If this was a purposeful strategy on the part of Kreis, he clearly needed to be far more concerned with how it translated positionally to defensive marking and cutting off passing lanes or he should have had his head examined. Eddie Pope was constantly having to abandon his sweeper position because Kotschau and Lancos both failed to step forward to ball inside the 25. This is unacceptable performance. In truth, without the inspired performances on behalf of Pope and Rimando, the score certainly would have been far worse.
While we’re on the topic of scoreline, Jason, how can you sit by and not use the utter disrespect that other teams and coaches in this league have for RSL as a motivating tool. I sat and listened to Curt Onalfo talk about how he couldn’t be happy with his team’s performance in this game until he saw 4 goals in the back of the net. How can you sit back and take that kind of disrespect and not motivate your team?
The relative talent level of this squad, while clearly diminished by the exodus of Jeff Cunningham, is hardly the worst in the league. Sadly, we are relatively weak at several key positions, and most specifically, the one piece which you would expect to be the building block of any team…Defensive Mid. How well would the U-20’s have done in Canada without the presence of the phenomenally talented Micheal Bradley in front of their back four. I like the physical presence Atiba Harris brings to D-mid, and his tireless running definitely serves a purpose…but his inability to pass well out of the back and to effectively provide a support option for the wings and outside backs is stunting our ability to move the ball through the midfield…increasingly opting to knock a ball long to nobody. Possession is an important part of attack, and if we can’t maintain possession in the midfield, we will constantly be forcing our defense to handle short-handed counters. It’s like Kreis is opting for the polar opposite approach from Ellinger. For Ellinger, possession was more important than scoring, whereas Kreis seems to act like it’s actually a totally separate subject. You can’t hide behind the vague idea that the “chemistry” on this team isn’t good…The talent is there, if they can’t find out how to utilize each other, then I see that as a coaching issue. Lock them in a room with a ball until they find a way to get a competitive advantage.
Ultimately, I am amazed that nobody has seen Ballouchy’s potential to play D-mid. Clearly it would take a lot of work, and he would need to be far more tenacious and learn a great deal about defensive positioning, but he’s tall, he’s got stamina and acceleration to spare, he’s very hard to knock off the ball, and he makes good safe passes. With some work, he could be an excellent defensive midfielder.
I’m also surprised that a player like Harris, with great speed and stamina isn’t used on the wing. His first touch, which is so often abysmal would be substantially mitigated by playing him outside, and he could reek havoc on most outside defenders in the league. How often do you think you’d press forward as an outside defender if you knew you’d have to catch Atiba going the other way?
What’s Up with Jimenez…In fairness, it’s been a while since I’ve been to practice, but he has played solidly in many of the reserve games I’ve seen, and was looking increasingly confident in what practices I’ve made it to. I have no problem with playing wingert on the wing in theory, but it kills me that we don’t want to start 2 fast outside backs. Why force yourselves to play at a disadvantage from the outset? If the impetus for playing Kotschau and Lancos on the outside was that they play better position, it seriously backfired as RSL’s defense was constantly pulled out of position in this game.
All in all, I’m not sure what in the hell Kreis will opt to put on the field for the Boca and Everton games, but without some kind of significant change in the communication levels on this team, I hardly see us putting up much of a challenge to either team. If we played like we did last night, I find it hard to imagine us being competitive against BYU, let alone some of the better clubs in the world.
I am hopeful that there is ultimately going to be an end to this dismal play, and I will keep you posted for signs of hope.
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