4/9/13 :: Santos : SSFC (CCL) -- KICK 17:00

[Ultra666]

Why is our 4th CB and Caskey starting this match?
Lamar should have been out there from the get go.

[Llarian]

Honestly, I have zero beef with Sigi.

His tactics were spot on, he can't finish those chances for our players.

EJ was fucking done, he had to come off the field. Martinez was anonymous.

Caskey was ok. Not great, but for Caskey has had an ok game. His corner service was a lot better than I'd seen from him for a while.

Neagle had a great game, and I hope he sees more minutes, but there's a danger in deciding a player should start based on this small sample size. Neagle has always been an off the bench player, when we've started him before (and Montreal as well) he hasn't performed as well.

Zak tried damn hard, credit to him for that. But, yeah, his finishing was shit. He had by far the best chances and took 1-2 too many touches every time.

I'd like to see more runs into the 18 from players off the ball. Hell, I'd like to see more movement off the ball in general. A couple times there was a very clear rebound opportunity but everybody in the center had stopped their runs rather than getting into the 18 to potentially pick up a rebound, so it was easily cleared by the Santos defense. And, funny enough, our goal came off a rebound. I don't understand why we never see our players setup for rebounds. (I understand some of that holding back is fear of a Santos counter, but Zak isn't much good against a counter anyways for example)

[ProdigalReality]

Our 4th CB started because our 2nd choice has a broken foot and our 3rd choice plays like a fucking idiot and was one of the big reasons we got murdered last year in Torrean.

[Llarian]

Our 4th CB started because our 2nd choice has a broken foot and our 3rd choice plays like a fucking idiot and was one of the big reasons we got murdered last year in Torrean.

This match has me agreeing with Lukasz more times than I ever thought possible...

[finnfan]

Why is our 4th CB and Caskey starting this match?
Lamar should have been out there from the get go.

Neagle had zero minutes of playing time before this match, so I would have been very surprised to see him start. Why he had not seen the field before this is another question. That has certainly surprised me. Not that I had expected him to get starts, but he has been good off the bench before, so the fact we hadn't used him even once before is odd. edit. Looks like he has 9 minutes in MLS this season. The point still largely stands.

Llarian had good points about Neagle starting. When has he ever been good as a starter? Also, I think Sigi still bases a lot of his decision wrt Neagle on that one playoff match at RSL. Not sure if that is fair, but it was a good example of how bad Neagle can perform. Caskey at least wasn't a defensive liability.

Hurtado's benching mystifies me too. I thought he had a good start to the season, and seems to have been dropped to the bench for no apparent reason.

[ProdigalReality]

Hurtado got dropped for his piss poor game at RSL.

[Jabsco]

Hurtado got dropped for his piss poor game at RSL.

There were 7-8 other guys that had a piss poor game at RSL, too.

[JerrarDAtkinson]

I thought we handled ourselves well. Santos were pretty predictable. They were happy to keep the pace slow for the most part, and seized opportunities to counter. Our approach was correct, imo, and I was proud (but of course disappointed) when the match ended.

On defense, I think we had it just about right. When we pressed it was effective. We forced them into sloppy clearances or giveaways a decent number of times. Although it was frustrating at times as they leisurely passed the ball around the back, those times gave us a chance to rest and get our shape. Overall we did a good job of choosing when to press. Once they did come forward, we mostly forced them to play through the middle, where Alonso and Joseph did ok in their battles. They were most dangerous when they played balls directly into Gomez and Peralta. Their movement and understanding and skill were beyond what we could deal with. I could only shake my head on several occasions as I watched Gomez handle a difficult ball first time, while battling with Scott or Traore for position, and lay it off perfectly for Peralta (meanwhile EJ or Zak would mis-control a ball on the ground into their feet...). We definitely got pulled out and the back line were slaughtered by one pass too many times for me to feel comfortable. Luckily they didn't have the finish or the final ball to punish us. I was happy overall with Yedlin and Leo.

To be honest, I'm not sure how we created so many chances. I thought we were pretty bad on the ball, and didn't show much creativity. Somehow we managed a handful of good chances though which, if anything, gave us the belief we could get something out of it. EJ and Zak seemed to find space well enough, although what they were capable creating of once they got into position was disappointing. I agreed with the subs. EJ was toast and Martinez wasn't providing anything. The timing was right as well, the two fresh players at 60 minutes made a difference and Rosales looked to have put some of his bad form behind him. The one thing that left me fuming was the number of players happy to sit 25-30 yards out when the ball was being delivered into the box in the last ten minutes. That is the time to gamble and it would have been nice to see at least one of Joseph or Alonso breaking their necks to get in there and Caskey making the late run at the back post. Why not?

All in all this was a great run in the CCL. We faced two of the best teams on the continent and I think we grew a lot through the experiences. We stayed in the tournament without ever really being able to field our best team. It gives me hope going forward that our bench is strong and that we aren't as inept tactically as most claim. I think we can face the league with confidence after our continental experiences and we shouldn't be so harsh on our team and management for not having it all solved, because it is a process and this group still has potential to do some special things this season.

[FuzzyForeigner]

ugh. tough week for me football-wise.