Despite having a couple of games to play on Saturday, I did manage to get out to see some of Saturday’s “dress rehearsal” practice. For the first time in the countless practices I’ve been to over the last 2 1/2 years, this is the the first one which featured a full field intersquad scrimmage. Whether this was a function of the week off and wanting to maintain some game-time consistency, or merely an opportunity to see Kreis’ trialists in full field space I couldn’t say. Sadly, as my time was limited, I didn’t have an opportunity to get to talk to any of the coaching staff. More importantly, I had the opportunity to witness first-hand what until now I’ve been forced to take other people’s word for…namely the play of Edgar Espindola, Javier Morales and Matias Mantilla. I can say with great certainty that the transition to put any one of these players into the starting lineup will be far less seamless than any of RSL’s recent transactions. Findley, Sturgis, Wingert, and Beckerman all walked right onto the field to show immediate impact. I don’t expect the same from the new Argentine players. And while it’s not technically certain that Jason will sign them all, from the playing time they had, I would be surprised to see it any other way. I just wish that the play that I had seen was more of a no-brainer decision. I guess that the relative value of the choice will depend a lot on salary requirements for the three. Not that RSL doesn’t have the money, but rather that none of these players seemed to me of DP caliber and in the case of Espindola, I’m not sure he would even start.
Morales, or “Javi” is by far the most interesting player of the three. While he is clearly very composed and confident on the ball, he was having great difficulty seeing the structure of the attack. He obviously was not seeing eye to eye with his squad in the scrimmage in terms of the progression of play. His passing was surprisingly undangerous given the space he was able to command in the middle. He clearly wanted several times to hit the end of the offensive wheel coming from the rotation…(if you imagine that Javi has possessed and positioned himself to pass on the right side of the midfield, ten yards past midfield. Brown and Brown, rather than making diagonal runs across the goal were looking to run more directly forward…had they run across the goal to draw the central defenders, the left midfielder would have been open up the wing…this was the pass it looked like he was looking to hit, but the area was congested due to miscommunication. He weights passes quite well, but his accuracy on longer passes seemed suspect to me. For an attacking midfielder he was good in defensive transition, and rather than the wide roaming style we are used to seeing from RSL midfielders, Javi plays a much more naturally central role. He plays a much more consistent style than Williams, but didn’t show much flair to produce space. He and Andy are very different players, and bring very different styles to the pitch. While Andy relishes attacking and baiting defenders, Javi seemed far more content to pass and receive quickly to create the same space. He moves well off the ball and likes to maintain controlling position rather than commit to more compromised positions. I liked what I saw, but his passes were frequently off the mark and occasionally ill-conceived.
Matias Mantilla played sweeper for the duration of the practice. He was positionally sound, made some good steps forward when warranted, and generally played a smart structural game. He did occasionally step forward to challenge the wrong ball, one he was poorly positioned in the flow to handle cleanly. He has poise on the ball, and certainly did not appear flustered. I would have liked to see him play against Findley, who by far looked the most dangerous striker on the pitch for us. I also would have liked to see him challenge in the air more often to see how well he judges the ball. He did get forward on a corner and made contact…something few and far between from RSL corner kicks, but didn’t manage a clean strike. I Don’t know how well he would play stopper, or whether Kreis and Pope would be willing to experiment with a side-by-side center. Nevertheless, he seemed quite natural playing sweeper.
Espindola, the player I most hoped would show me something to be excited about looked most out of sorts on the pitch. Unfortunately about the best thing I saw from him was making a couple of very heady runs which Jamie Watson clearly either didn’t expect or flat out didn’t see. A good ball on one of them would definitely have put him 1v1. He definitely worked hard for position the entire time, but barely saw a scrap of the ball.
So now I guess I know what people meant when their response to how the Argentines looked was, “meh”. It’s not that they look untalented, clearly they are skilled enough to play at this level…but merely that they don’t appear to be likely to radically transform the way RSL plays. Presumably if they are signed, they would be unlikely to be able to play this weekend, and it’s not all together clear that, were they eligible to play, that their impact would be substantial.
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