What To Do?

If Yogi Berra was a soccer guy, he might have said:

You can't gain ground on the teams above you in the table if you keep losing to teams below you because pretty soon there won't be teams below you in the table you can beat to gain ground on the ones above you.

Exactly.  You can't look it up but I think he's right.

Another wretched road performance from the Union as they fell to New England 0-3.  The 3 part is slightly misleading as there were some late goals but the 0 part is dead on.   They were better in the second half and I had hopes that when Picault and Ilsinho came on at 60 minutes that the Union would take advantage of the Revolution side that does allow a good number of goals.  Never happened.  So 9th in the table (New England slides past them) and six points short of a playoff berth. With 12 games to play you should be saying this ain't over but without any consistency, you don't see them making a run.

So what's up with this team?  I looked at two measures of player performance - the Audi Player Index (API) and the ratings at whoscored.com.  I'm a little skeptical of the Audi stuff based on a few things I've read plus I couldn't find the index using a per minute basis; this means more playing time can boost your ranking in comparison to an equally good player with fewer minutes.

First thing you notice is the dearth of players in the top 20 in either system.  C.J. Sapong's quality year is borne out by his rankings of 13th in the API and 15th at whoscored.  Blake is doing okay too at 35th and 32nd.  Medunjanin has been decent in my books, though he's dropped off a little bit lately;  he's at 47th and 54th, which is in line with my overall assessment.    One problem area I see is our designated player, Alejandro Bedoya is only at 153rd (partly of function of missed playing time I think) and 72nd (seems like a more accurate placement).  That's not awful, except in the context that he's supposed to be our standout player.  Sure wish we could see performances like he put on in the Gold Cup group play.

Onyewu (106/51) and Elliott (216/101) aren't awful either, while Gaddis (329/182) is somewhat worse than I would have guessed and Fabinho (254/98) is about where I'd expect.  The other place we are getting hurt is in the supporting cast.  Alberg (400/277), Ilsinho (331/159), Pontius (203/128) and Picault (295/137 - a little surprised those aren't better) don't rate well at all.  Simpson (430/294) just hasn't worked out so far.

You look at the Union goals scored and goals allowed and they are actually a plus two differential.  Twenty-nine goals is 9th lowest in the division but twenty-seven allowed is 4th best.  Short assessment for me - we don't have a standout or two (with apologies to CJ) and too many in the supporting cast aren't as good as we thought.  At least we don't have to worry about relegation.


Not Your Father's Gillette Stadium

For those [sorry souls?] that did tune in to see the Union-Revolution match, you might have been wondering why I had said the venue was perhaps the second worst in MLS.  I was shocked myself.  Where's the artificial turf? Where are all the football lines cluttering the playing surface?  Why does it seem larger?  Looked like a pretty good place to play.  Ah, it turns out there was some international club action scheduled the next day and those sides refuse to play on artificial turf.  So they laid down a real soccer pitch.  The players took out some serious divots but I thought it held up pretty well.

Also, did anybody else notice what Diego Fagundez does with his shorts?  Somehow he tucks the ends up so that they are shorter.  Couldn't find a picture from the match but in this promo shot you can see what I'm talking about.  I guess he feels the length gets in the way.






Pro and Con Pro/Rel

Speaking of relegation Soccer America just ran a recent piece on the advantages and disadvantages of American soccer moving to system of promotion and relegation.  You can read the article here.  The pro arguments are fan interest, incentive for player development and the threat that once expansion ends, the lower leagues will die off.  The cons are the investors and owners didn't put money into MLS with the expectation that they would be at risk for relegation and that getting relegated sucks.  As long as the league is expanding, it's probably going to be tough to implement pro/rel but I do think we'll need to get there eventually if we want to have professional soccer at something better than League Two quality.


MLS All-Stars 1 Real Madrid 1

Another contest unlikely to win over American fans.  More entertaining and wide open in the second half but I was hoping for more goals. The score is mildly misleading in that RMA had more possession and more shots and the MLS goal came late.   I always debate which side has the advantage in this format.  MLS players are in mid-season form but Real Madrid (or whichever international club team the all-stars take on) is a squad that plays together regularly.  Real Madrid held out Ronaldo (probably couldn't back from his court date on tax evasion) and Modric but played many other first teamers.  I still think this is a better format than MLS East vs MLS West.


A Word on Chester

One more friendly to go.  Still fine tuning the roster.  We did add Martin Skrtel of Liverpool fame for some depth at center back.  We are experimenting with five at the back.  The game's analytics and my coaches are telling me a 5-3-2 is our strongest formation but not completely sold on it yet.


Nothing New Tyneside

Except a pile of rumors.  Apparently the talks for McCarthy are still on but he just doesn't seem worth 25 million.  Many rumors about striker Lucas Perez being available for 14 million but for some reason this seems to be a tough one to close.  Part of it is Perez may want to go to Deportivo.  Also, I sometimes forget that the transfer fee isn't necessarily the sticking point - it could be the salary.  So you can't say if Newcastle are willing to sign McCarthy at 25 mil, why not Perez who's fee is so much less.  That happens to me all the time in Football Manager.  I get excited when I see Santi Cazorla is available for a $10 million transfer fee (which I can afford), then quickly realize the board will never approve his $105k per week salary.


The Weekend

Will be at Talen Energy to see the Union take on FC Dallas. They are second in the West, have a stingy defense and a pretty good goal differential.  Yeah, this should go well.