1. Drama! Here’s to the late goal
Show me an MLS manager, and I’ll show you one who loves the comfortable 2-0 or 3-0 win. Ah, yes, the unbridled joy of seeing his team grab an early lead and then manage out the match, owning the better chances until the second or even third insurance goals happily arrive. Those are the days that help keep managers young.
Now, for the home team fans: well, they certainly may enjoy a smooth evening where it’s “all systems go.” But the real memory makers are the nights marked by late game-winners.
The nerves are set on high alert as the home team presses and presses for all three points and then … Wham! There’s the goal! And there’s the tremendous, palpable sense of relieve that pulses through the teeming ground. The fans make their way home still on a stoppage-time winner high.
Those are the nights fans truly remember. So here’s to Week 4 in MLS, one with a trio of the late heart-pounders.
In Vancouver, Robert Earnshaw stole the show with his stoppage-time winner in a 2-1 Cascadia Cup thriller over Portland at BC Place.
Chris Pontius left it even later at RFK Stadium, where his goal for D.C. United deep into stoppage time sent the champs home hapless; United claimed the 1-0 win of the Galaxy.
Things were certainly thrilling for the home side in Utah. Well, maddening … and then thrilling. Toronto’s 88th-minute equalizer had all signs pointing toward “draw” with Real Salt Lake. But young RSL midfielder Jordan Allen, making just his fifth MLS appearance, found a heck of a time to score his first pro goal, the capper on a 2-1 win.
2. What gives with Portland’s collapsing defense?
Caleb Porter gets a lot of credit for ensuring that attractive, attacking soccer is part of the Providence Park experience. Good on him for it. Major League Soccer is a better place when coaches lean toward attacking players and forward-thinking tactics.
But if Portland can’t get a few more things right in defense, all the attacking soccer in Oregon won’t be enough to get the Timbers back into the playoffs.
There is a foursome of clubs still winless after MLS Week 4. Philadelphia, Montreal and Colorado aren’t big surprises, if we’re honest. Perhaps Portland isn’t either; after all, no member of that foursome made the playoffs last year. Plus, the Timbers are dealing with injuries to critical leaders, mostly notably Diego Valeri and Will Johnson.
Still, the Timbers have played twice at home, drawing both. They would have tied Vancouver on the road last week (a positive result, even one to build on, perhaps) but for a late, defensive collapse that has become a little too commonplace around Porter’s teams.
WATCH: Keys to the Match - FC Dallas at Portland Timbers FC
It happened earlier this year when Alan Gordon’s late equalizer prevented the Timbers from notching a “W.” And it happened late last year as Michael Bradley Bradley’s 89th minute game-winner in Toronto cost the Timbers a desperately-needed point.
The latest inquests are coming after Vancouver playmaker Pedro Morales inexplicably slipped a ball right between two hesitant Timbers center backs playing Robert Earnshaw through cleanly. He's not the best forward in the league but these are the chances he is deadly on and he had ample time to line up the dramatic winner.
It wasn’t the only defensive failure of the telling sequence; this was pretty much a total collapse in the back. (Watch the video here.) Dairon Asprilla whiffed on a chance to clear the initial, speculative ball played into the Timbers’ end. And someone in the middle probably could have stepped up quicker to challenge Morales’ through ball. Plus, on the back side of the telling sequence, Alvas Powell needed to step higher in order to perhaps catch Earnshaw offside.
So, yes … lots of blame to go around.
Leaders missing at crunch time certainly hurts. But at some point – even thinking back to the harrowing defensive collapse that cost Porter’s U.S. under-23s an Olympic spot in 2012 – you have to wonder if the manager’s overall approach and game management needs tweaking? Because the pattern is starting to look too much like, well, a pattern.
3. Does Jason Kreis need more “bangers” at Yankee Stadium?
MLS fans have seen enough of Jason Kreis’ teams to know how the highly respected manager wants to play. He needs technical types who can keep the ball on the ground.
But there’s a problem with that approach for a team that plays inside Yankee Stadium, where the field is small and the grass will generally be something less than perfect for soccer.
While it’s probably best that Kreis immediately establishes his brand, playing the long game, results could suffer on the front end. The perfect example arrived via a soaring Ike Opara goal over the weekend, the only strike in a 1-0 Sporting KC victory in the Bronx. If you think “soaring” is journalistic hyperbole, watch the goal. The dude soared; you want him on your side in the next slam dunk competition, I promise.
The goal came off a throw-in. With such a small field, there will be plenty of goal-mouth action, lots of balls to contest inside the 18. For that you need bangers. The bigger and “bangier” the better.
Take defender Jason Hernandez, for instance, who is just 5-foot-10. He’s technical enough to play for Kreis. But as a center back inside Yankee Stadium? That might not be the best fit. Same for defenders on the outside, or central midfielders. Kreis need technicians to play the desired style, but needs big bodies to contest for the assault of aerial efforts en route.
It’s a quandary for Kreis. Then again, New York City FC hired the man for a reason; it’s his job to problem solve around this one.
4. Talking about the “league player”
We’ve all seen the league standout who can’t quite pass muster at international level. Taylor Twellman probably falls into that group. So does Kreis (back in his playing days). Perhaps even Chris Wondolowski.
We look at these guys as standouts in league play but, for whatever reason, they just didn’t get it done when they put on the national team shirt, when the overall quality rises. And that’s fine! There is nothing to feel badly about in building a solid, pro career as a standout MLS man.
But riddle me this: why do we only tend to apply that tag to MLS men? Why don’t we say the same of certain players who earn a living abroad? Why do we assume that because someone plays in the Bundesliga or wherever that they are automatically excluded from the “league player” principal?
I give you U.S. fullback Timothy Chandler.
I mean, he plays in the Bundesliga! So he must be good enough at international level, right?
Well, no. Because when was the last time Chandler excelled in the U.S. shirt? His afternoon in Zurich in Tuesday’s 1-1 draw may have been Chandler’s best performance in a U.S. shirt – and yet it was still highly flawed in too many ways.
Anybody wanna make a case for David Regis? He was hurried through the citizenship process a few years ago because, well, you know, he played in Europe. Thus, if follows, he must be worthy of an international spot. Only, it never worked out that way. He was really never any better than the MLS men he replaced.
So let’s just get past this, can we?
There will be more “league men” in MLS. And there may well be others from abroad.
5. The Little Five
5a. Every time I watch Alejandro Bedoya for the national team, I find more reasons to like his game. (So long as he is deployed wide, that is). Technical, fit, industrious, willing on defense and always looking to make positive, attacking runs, he has lapped Graham Zusi in my mind for one of the wide attacking spots. And in fact, he’s now what I would call an automatic write-in, one of the names Jurgen Klinsmann pencils in more or less automatically, and then builds the rest of the lineup around them. The others are Brad Guzan, Michael Bradley, Clint Dempsey and Jozy Altidore.
5b. If the United States had a big, meaningful match today, who are the starting center backs? Hard to say, isn’t it? Months of experimentation since the World Cup have created something of a void in this way.
5c. Everything that’s wrong with Chicago can be summarized in one name: Quincy Amarikwa. He has started every game this year, and started 29 last year. But the numbers simply do not support his status as a starter: Amarikwa has 15 goals in 115 career matches (47 starts) – and those simply are not starters’ numbers. When it comes to analysis, sometimes it’s just this simple: Sometimes the players just aren’t good enough.
5d. Two MLS men I would have loved to have seen in Europe with the national team: New York’s Dax McCarty and Chicago’s Harry Shipp. Both are having outstanding seasons.
5e. Deployed at the top of the midfield diamond, Michael Bradley probably had his worst match since the World Cup – when, of course, he was played at the top of the midfield diamond. He was so much better, miles and miles more effective, from the recessed positions in midfield as we saw against Denmark a few days earlier. Personally, I’d like to see Jurgen Klinsmann stationed at the classroom blackboard, Bart Simpson style, and instructed to write 100 times, “Michael Bradley is not a No. 10.”
Steve Davis has covered Major League Soccer since is first kick in 1996. He writes on-line for World Soccer Talk and Fusion TV’s Soccergods, and co-hosts the weekly radio show/podcast ESPN Soccer Today on 103.3 FM in Dallas. Davis is also the radio play-by-play voice for FC Dallas on 100.7 FM.
