He expects to be in full training by Tuesday. Should be 100% by Seattle.Originally Posted by mowe
He expects to be in full training by Tuesday. Should be 100% by Seattle.
I'm concerned because as many have stated we don't have much depth and if this is not taken care of we will struggle for the 8th season in a row. We all know we will have injuries to our starters and we don't have much in terms of depth to come in and cover for any injuries. Guys like Morgan,Hall, Wiedeman and Lambe would have a tough time making most MLS benches as subs.
Anyone have a link to the whole game? So far I can only see the game in 6.
Wasn't broadcast on Youtube so I don't think there's an archive of the full game. If you'd like a synopsis it's basically this: movement, passing and possession was about as good as the Philly game in the first half, but two defensive lapses led to goals. After the penalty in the first 5 or so minutes of the 2nd half they visibly stopped trying to win the game.
Last edited by notthesun; 03-01-2014 at 06:23 PM.
Not on Goltv either. There were no commentators so it may not be available on any network..?
As for depth, yep. That's the challenge that this year's Koevermans/Frings 2.0 Plan brings.
Next year it is imperative to keep the draft picks AND draft well. Hopefully, with all the money being thrown around they have put a little aside to get a scout.
Hagland's a good player, so somebody seemed to do their homework.
***
Only caught the video highlights on my phone - I was wondering who the young guy was who got that goal that wasn't. DeRo pretty flexible at his age.
And can we just give Bradley the ball in dead ball situations now unless Defoe wants them? Nobody else need apply.
Last edited by OgtheDim; 03-01-2014 at 06:22 PM.
I get what your saying but who was Gilberto and Hagglund last year?
FORMER FULL TIME KOOL-AID DRINKER
Thanks.
From my brief view of the highlights I would focus in on the second goal. As far as I can see that's EXACTLY how we are trying to play / break down the other team. Midfield uses their range of passing to directly find the wide players, wide players pick out the strikers who try to pull off the defenders. Still feel this plays pretty channel focused and the occasional tendency of the midfielders to stretch leave us exposed.
I'm not certain if we should be concerned about the defensive lapses or not. They might be a youth focused team but they are much more balanced than a typical MLS squad. Movement off the ball is far superior compared to what we typically play against. Have never been much of a fan of Morgan, I don't think we saw anything strange today, just more of the usual.
Last edited by ag futbol; 03-01-2014 at 06:24 PM.
If you look at the goals they scored our outside backs hurt us hard. The first goal Caldwell takes his man and sticks to him, but Hall is completely unaware of the drifter until it's too late (Bekker not exactly covering himself in glory either). Morgan still can't defend 1v1 either.
Second goal was more of a team breakdown, but Morgan is still caught between applying heavy pressure to block the pass, and covering the overlapping player. Instead he's useless. Those who think DeRo should play in midfield would do well to watch this goal again also.
On the 3rd goal Hall is behind his man for no reason (if he was in front he could've just cleared it). Taking another look at it now it actually seems like a totally clean tackle, but regardless there's no reason to slide in there, the guy is going nowhere.
4th goal is straight up terrible. Seems like a communication error because Hall points to the guy before the cross comes in, but Jackson doesn't respond. But that's still Hall's man to pick up and he does an awful job.
My main concern heading into the season with the defense is the fact that our RB will have no game experience with the rest of the backline. If you plug in Morrow instead of Morgan today I think we avoid a goal or two, and Morrow has had time with the rest of the group on the field. Orr will simply have to perform on the day otherwise we could be in trouble.
Last edited by notthesun; 03-01-2014 at 06:27 PM.
I'm still confused by our organization and to a certain extent the collection of players we have on this club.
Not sure I understand, are you talking about depth on this year's team vs last year?
For me, I think that Domestic depth is the key to the league. Trading up to get Hagglund is an example of what we need to be doing with more regularity. To this point, the only other draft pick we had was Bekker.
A quick look at SKC's roster yields drafted players like Besler, Bunbury, Sapong, Myers still very active and contributing. We can't keep relying on trades and the waiver draft to find Domestic players.
TFC Draft History (1st round picks):
2007 - Maurice Edu (1st)
Andrew Boyens (10th)
2008
*TFC was to select 2nd overall but they traded that to Dallas to get Richard Mulroney. Dallas drafted Brek Shea
Julius James (10th)
Pat Phelan (11th)
2009
Sam Cronin (2)
O’Brien White (4)
Stefan Frei (13)
2010 – no pick, traded to Dallas for Adrian Serioux (5th overall)
2011 – no pick, traded to Vancouver for Nathan Sturgis (8th overall)
2012
Luis Silva (4)
Aaron Maund (12)
2013
Kyle Bekker (3)
Emery Welshman (16)* TFC traded down a couple of times to get Welshman. This was originally a 4th overall pick that Vancouver used to select Kekuta Manneh, a Generation Adidas player with no budget charge who scored 6 in 20 apps for the Caps last year
2014
* Originally had the 3rd overall pick but that went to Vancouver for Hassli
Nick Hagglund (10)
I have not seen Bekker make a tackle yet....way too soft.
Morgan just earned himself a trip to Wilmington, if he's lucky. I don't know why he's in such a funk for the last two seasons. I have a feeling there's some mental issues there. Maybe he just needs to get some confidence back.
This. Many of the top ten picks from last year's draft were studs last year. TFC could have had great players.
One thing we don't know fully about last season was the position we were in vis-a-vis wages as left over by the geniuses that were running the team before KP got here. From what I could parse from KP and RN during interviews last season, we were at or near the cap with not that many players on the roster.
Although we could have gotten this or that player in the draft in 2013, it looks like the goal of that draft was to get allocation to help deal with the mess. In that, KP succeeded.
Moving to 2015, IIRC, TL hates the idea of giving up draft picks or position for allocation. We may trade those picks but I would be very surprised. It has become obvious that this team lacks depth, and out of 4 first round drafts next season, there should be somebody able to provide depth (like Haggelund seems to be doing this season).
As for Bekker, the guy needs to play a lot against more skillful and experienced opponents then he saw in college ball - he would get that in Wilmington. I fear though that our depth is so bad in the midfield that unfortunately, Bekker is the #3 guy this season.
The draft history is pretty interesting. Looks like there are some very good picks (3) , a few solid picks ( 3 ) and some shocking gaps. For a club that only had 6 wins in 2011. I can't believe the 2 year gap. Fortunately next year should start a positive trend in the draft history (how many 1st round picks next year? 4?) with NCAA classes showing better quality each year. The 2015 draft alone should help upgrade the depth in players 12 - 20.
What is it you're confused about?
Our team has way more depth than it did last year. I'm not sure how you say our depth in midfield is "so bad" that Bekker is the #3 guy (whatever that is). Our midfield is stacked by MLS standards. Bradley, De Ro, Rey, Osorio, Jackson, Hall, Lambe all are ahead of Bekker. That's a good midfield. I agree that Bekker should go to Wilmington to get experience. In my personal opinion he's not that good, so I don't really care where he goes. You can't learn heart.
You mentioned it. We were put in a horrible spot by Aaron Winter. TFC was capped out and had a terrible roster. We had the two highest paid defenders in the league (O' Day and Eckersley) and both were awful.
Easy, friend. That's a sad road to travel.
Could'a Cres.
Should'a St.
Would'a Ave.
All on the wrong side of the tracks...
FORMER FULL TIME KOOL-AID DRINKER
Love all the draft work. It paints a picture but I respectfully disagree that this is the same M.O. as the Frings/Koevs year.
FORMER FULL TIME KOOL-AID DRINKER
Fullback has been an area they are still testing the depth, trialling agboss, hagglund and even hall. Have to hope Orr and bloom are 2 and 3 on the depth chart or this could be a problem. Maybe when they return Morgan will rise to the occasion like he showed when Elmer was brought in. It's a shame he is not improving more defensively as his athleticism should give him an edge.
I'll try to make this short, but formation wise I still feel there is a large hole between the strikers and the mid and of course our style of 4-4-2 makes me skeptical. In the midfield I think we lack quality ball winners outside of Bradley. Confused about the way they use Jackson out wide, don't think he's up for what we ask him to do. Up front, I think Gilberto - Defoe is an odd pairing.
I agree, for the most part. I don't know how it will play out but I'm hoping we'll see some tactical nuance this year, I.e. targeting our opponents' weakest spots and not just playing horizontally but on the diagonal as well. If Bradley's going to be a roving wrecker then we need the second player to be very positionally reliant on him or to play mostly just as an in-the-hole attacker, like in a diamond. Right now, we're playing flat with the second mid basically just playing a backup role to bradley, filling the opposing space, staying deep if the general goes up etc.
I'm not sure what they'll do with Defoe and Gilberto either, but since the latter seems to play off the shoulder all the time, and we know Defoe can dribble on the run and beat guys, maybe they'll play him a little deeper.
There seemed to be a lot of triangles, and overlapping and support play, but the final ball was lacking in the last three games. They also didn't pay nearly enough attention to the opposite field and got caught too narrow several times, with no one covering the back post man or the midfielders coming up to the top of the box for second balls or layoffs.
I wonder about Jackson; he really looks more like a fullback to me. He gets in hard on the tackle and he's quite careful, he has good speed; but he makes poor decisions about trying to beat his man.
Some of our young defenders are still prone to ball watching instead of closing on the ball and being positionally aware of who's lurking behind them. We may yet need a solid veteran defender to shore things up.
he speaks for us all...................Nelson's faith in our 'bench'...without demanding better may be his undoing.
ALL HELL'S BROKEN LOOSEhttp://gfycat.com/SharpKindArrowana
I think it's obvious for anyone to see that we have historically drafted very poorly and missed out on SOO much talent. That hopefully this year has finally changed.
2012 Winter/Mariner Era (Moves made before end of March)
DPs: Koevermans (30) Frings (34), JDG (28)
Signed: Lambe (22), Plata (19), Eckersley (23), Caceido (32), Aceval (31), Emory (24)
Traded for: Hall (24)
Drafted: Silva, Maund
Noteworthy: Traded JDG in the summer and then acquired Eric Hassli (31)
2013 The Payne Era (Moves made before end of March)
DPs retained: Koevermans (31), Frings (35)
Signed/Loan: DP Laba (22), Osorio (21), Earnshaw (31), Russell (33), Richter (24), Bostock (23), Ephraim (25)
Traded for: Braun (26), Bendik (24),
Drafted: Bekker, Welshman, Agbossoumonde, Califf (33)
Also noteworthy signed Rey, Elmer, Urutti through the season
2014 Tim L Era
DPs: Defoe (31), Bradley (26), Gilberto (24)
Traded for: Morrow (26), Jackson (25),
Signed/Loan: DeRosario (35), Orr (31), Cesar (35)
Drafted: Hagglund
What do you see as fundamentally different about this year's plan?
About the only real noticeable difference is that the DPs are younger. Though with Defoe having a lengthy injury not sure we can say that equals healthier.
Any better off than having Urutti and Laba?
A lot of the signed/loaned guys are 30+. Tim L/B hasn't used the draft as a vehicle yet though the stockpiling of 2015 picks is encouraging. Mostly rely on signings to improve depth. Morrow/Jackson make any bigger contribution than Braun/Bendik? We'll see.
Orr and Morrow will be our starting RB-LB,if they are healthy....Hall and Morgan have REPEATEDLY proven they are not even at MLS caliber.
Fair enough.
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