I would have put this in tactics forum but it seems to have gone away.
The high line worries me. There is a lot more to making this work than simply pushing your defenders higher up the pitch. The high line compacts the space in the midfield making it easier to press the opposition, giving them less time on the ball to pick the pass in behind the defense. The offside trap goes hand in hand with the high line as well.
Here is were I am concerned.
- We aren't pressing in the midfield. We are allowing the opposition too much time on the ball, and that gives them more time to play in behind us
- The high line/offside trap requires a back line that is very familiar with playing with each other in order to play this successfully. Our back line is not familiar. Aceval is new. Emory is new. Manud is new. It takes more than a few pre-season games, training sessions, and even a few competitive matches to build this level of familiarity.
- With the exception of Morgan, e lack speed in defense. When the ball gets played in behind, we need pace to recover.
Against Seattle it was pretty plain to see how this hurt us. I also thought despite the result, the game away against LA was worrying in this regard. LA got behind us too many times. Kocic came up big and saved us that game, and luck was with us for a change when MaGee's goal was called back for offside (he looked on to me).
I think we are going to get burned a lot on this...