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  1. #31
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    Quote Originally Posted by notthesun View Post
    Yet last year Giovinco played every game but we still had the tied-league worst defense?

    Oldtimer is correct. Giovinco has little to do with our improved defense. It's down to Bez's acquisitions in the off-season, and tactical adjustments from Vanney (making Bradley a full-time defensive mid in particular).
    Goals conceded don't tell the whole story if you are forced to play a different style to mitigate damage.

    Good line + no outlet = shaky team
    Bad line + MVP outlet = shaky team
    Bad line + No outlet = Fucked
    Good line + MVP outlet = Well, you understand.

    It could be (gasp) a combination of things.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Red4ever View Post
    Goals conceded don't tell the whole story if you are forced to play a different style to mitigate damage.

    Good line + no outlet = shaky team
    Bad line + MVP outlet = shaky team
    Bad line + No outlet = Fucked
    Good line + MVP outlet = Well, you understand.

    It could be (gasp) a combination of things.
    It's still over-emphasizing Giovinco's impact on the defense. I mean, we added a box-to-box midfielder, are now playing with a dedicated DM, and outright replaced half the back line and the keeper. That's just clearly been the most important factor.

    Giovinco was a poor outlet in the Colorado and SKC games, where we were playing long balls to relieve pressure and he obviously couldn't take them down. But the defense was still solid in both those games. Colorado scored when we were still trying to re-organize after the red card and SKC only scored because of Toledo.

    Do teams maybe hold a guy or two back to keep an eye on Giovinco when they're pressing? Yeah, sure. But that's like 10% of why our defense is so improved compared to the reasons mentioned above.

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    For a case study, Drogba is of equivalent level to Giovinco. He is always dangerous, creates chances out of nothing. Give him space and he'll score! Pair him with Piatti and he's devastating. Yet TFC managed to shut him down. What's the difference? It has to come down to personnel and coaching. Vanney's strategy was excellent. All of our defensive players stepped up.
    MLS is a tough, physical league, that emphasizes speed, and features plastic fields, grueling travel, extreme weather, and incompetent refs. - NK Toronto

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    I have to give Vanney credit. It took him a while, but he is finally playing the way, I thought we should be playing. Focus on organization, defense and specified roles, and let our tallent take care of the offense. We keep doing this all year, with the necessary adjustments game in and game out, and we should go far.

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    It just goes to show what happens when you stick to a plan for a couple of seasons and stick to a squad and build on it!

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    I really hope we don't rest on our laurels though, all teams are adding to and improving their rosters. The sooner we find an upgrade to the likes of Delgado or help role players like that to improve sufficiently, the better.

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    Quote Originally Posted by T-boy View Post
    It just goes to show what happens when you stick to a plan for a couple of seasons and stick to a squad and build on it!
    Well.... The person you're entrusting your team to needs to have at least some idea what they are doing. I doubt half the guys we've hired previously could do anything with a world of stability.

    Still surprised at the lengths people are going not to give the coach credit. I'm not the biggest fan but let's call it what it is here. Heck, Molinaro was very skeptical of Vanny in preseason and he's come around to give him praise.

  8. #38
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    Quote Originally Posted by MartinUtd View Post
    Respectfully disagree. Having a player like Giovinco prevents a full commitment from the opposing offense. We're way less likely to be pinned in our own box like years before when we've got such a potent counter attack threat. That's not Vanney's set up either, it's an outstanding individual that's putting the fear in the opposition.
    We had Giovinco last year. Just sayin'

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    Quote Originally Posted by trane View Post
    I have to give Vanney credit. It took him a while, but he is finally playing the way, I thought we should be playing. Focus on organization, defense and specified roles, and let our tallent take care of the offense. We keep doing this all year, with the necessary adjustments game in and game out, and we should go far.
    Excellent analysis.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Oldtimer View Post
    For a case study, Drogba is of equivalent level to Giovinco. He is always dangerous, creates chances out of nothing. Give him space and he'll score! Pair him with Piatti and he's devastating. Yet TFC managed to shut him down. What's the difference? It has to come down to personnel and coaching. Vanney's strategy was excellent. All of our defensive players stepped up.
    Drogba is on his last legs, while Giovinco comparatively is just a young lad of 29.

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    Quote Originally Posted by MightyDM View Post
    We had Giovinco last year. Just sayin'
    We also had a rotating gong show at CB and fullback on whatever side was opposite to Morrow. I'm pretty sure it's Bez that has addressed those obvious issues... still not sure if Vanney brings anything to the table.

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    I never thought he should be fired after 8 games in any scenario, I think Manning made a mistake with that 8 point thing, and got lucky with it. No coach can "deliver" x points in 8 games. You can win games you should lose, and vice versa.

    This is a veteran team, that has the highest payroll of any team in MLS, that should perform at this level.

    I respect Vanney for not messing it up.

    I don't really like the way the team's been playing, until this last game in Montreal. So I'd like to see where we are at the midway point before voting.
    “What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”

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    Quote Originally Posted by BelfastBoy View Post
    Drogba is on his last legs, while Giovinco comparatively is just a young lad of 29.
    Look at his stats. Last legs or not, he is punishing teams when he does play.

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    Quote Originally Posted by ensco View Post
    I never thought he should be fired after 8 games in any scenario, I think Manning made a mistake with that 8 point thing, and got lucky with it. No coach can "deliver" x points in 8 games. You can win games you should lose, and vice versa.

    This is a veteran team, that has the highest payroll of any team in MLS, that should perform at this level.

    I respect Vanney for not messing it up.

    I don't really like the way the team's been playing, until this last game in Montreal. So I'd like to see where we are at the midway point before voting.
    thats fair. But my point earlier, put differently, is that last years Vanney would have not gotten the potential out of this years team. For example, Altidore and Bradley are vastly more disciplined and far more effective from a team perspective than last year. Vanney gets at least some credit for that.

    yes, there will be tests to come, but he has showed more to me this year than I ever expected, particularly after the two losses against Montreal when he showed no tactical sense or understanding of the weaknesses of his players. It's like a whole new person.

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    Quote Originally Posted by MightyDM View Post
    thats fair. But my point earlier, put differently, is that last years Vanney would have not gotten the potential out of this years team. For example, Altidore and Bradley are vastly more disciplined and far more effective from a team perspective than last year. Vanney gets at least some credit for that.

    yes, there will be tests to come, but he has showed more to me this year than I ever expected, particularly after the two losses against Montreal when he showed no tactical sense or understanding of the weaknesses of his players. It's like a whole new person.
    But for John Terry slipping while taking a PK, Avram Grant would have won the Champions League.

    I have learned to be very careful about causality in life. There needs to be a narrative, a qualitative component.

    I agree with those who say that Saturday might have been the most complete TFC game ever. Give me a few more of those, and I'll vote for a big contract for Vanney.
    Last edited by ensco; 04-25-2016 at 08:26 PM.
    “What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”

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    Quote Originally Posted by ensco View Post
    But for John Terry slipping while taking a PK, Avram Grant would have won the Champions League.

    I have learned to be very careful about causality in life. There needs to be a narrative, a qualitative component.

    I agree with those who say that Saturday might have been the most complete TFC game ever. Give me a few more of those, and I'll vote for a big contract for Vanney.
    i am totally with you, Ensco. But before yesterday, SKC, and the Energy drinks, I seriously wondered whether Vanney had even the basic skills to be a manager in this league. Those three games showed he has been capable of significant improvement.

    plus the team is a pleasure to watch, if you like competent grinding soccer. Which I do. It's enough to take me for the total
    sceptic to the cautiously optimistic.

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    ^I did get the feeling against Montreal that we were playing defensively with real purpose, staying tight and looking for the quick transition, as opposed to just bunkering 10 men behind the ball.
    “What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”

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    Quote Originally Posted by Oldtimer View Post
    Look at his stats. Last legs or not, he is punishing teams when he does play.
    Any club would choose Seba over drugba in a heartbeat. It's not even an argument.

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    Quote Originally Posted by ensco View Post
    I never thought he should be fired after 8 games in any scenario, I think Manning made a mistake with that 8 point thing, and got lucky with it. No coach can "deliver" x points in 8 games. You can win games you should lose, and vice versa.

    This is a veteran team, that has the highest payroll of any team in MLS, that should perform at this level.

    I respect Vanney for not messing it up.

    I don't really like the way the team's been playing, until this last game in Montreal. So I'd like to see where we are at the midway point before voting.
    I don't understand what you are getting at with the bolded statement.
    8 points in 8 games in MLS with one of the highest pay roles in the league should be very doable...which is what it seems like you are saying in your following statement.
    So why was it a mistake for Manning to make that commitment?

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    Quote Originally Posted by jabbronies View Post
    I don't understand what you are getting at with the bolded statement.
    8 points in 8 games in MLS with one of the highest pay roles in the league should be very doable...which is what it seems like you are saying in your following statement.
    So why was it a mistake for Manning to make that commitment?
    Too small a sample. A good team can easily fail to get 8 points in 8 road games. A bad team could get 8 points without deserving it. Plus the context (injuries, things not known publicly) could matter a lot.

    It's a moot point, Manning skated it, but I would have been upset had Manning canned Vanney after 8 games, and not because I love Vanney.

    Really, you never see this, no leader should ever do this to a manager. It's not the right way to run the business. As I respect Manning and his managerial resume, I actually think/hope it was just a tactic used to create urgency with the players, and Manning never intended to fire Vanney regardless of how the season started, and if so, I hope he told Vanney that from the beginning.
    Last edited by ensco; 04-25-2016 at 09:54 PM.
    “What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”

  21. #51
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    Quote Originally Posted by C.Ronaldo View Post
    someone here told me we wont see the diamond ever again.

    I expect some crow eating
    Oh, you get used to it. I was told not a month ago that Mo Babouli had "no chance" of making a first team impact this season. I suppose my weekly prediction rate alone is probably somewhere south of abysmal!

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    Quote Originally Posted by ensco View Post
    Too small a sample. A good team can easily fail to get 8 points in 8 road games. A bad team could get 8 points without deserving it. Plus the context (injuries, things not known publicly) could matter a lot.

    It's a moot point, Manning skated it, but I would have been upset had Manning canned Vanney after 8 games, and not because I love Vanney.

    Really, you never see this, no leader should ever do this to a manager. It's not the right way to run the business. As I respect Manning and his managerial resume, I actually think/hope it was just a tactic used to create urgency with the players, and Manning never intended to fire Vanney regardless of how the season started, and if so, I hope he told Vanney that from the beginning.
    He's probably telling him it now, after Bradley's quote basically promoting Greg, which we've never seen before.

    It's too early to say he's a great coach as we're just hitting where we're supposed to be with this lineup. But I'm optimistic; once given the right personnel, we've looked the better team in really all but one game this season, and even in that game it didn't help having a player wrongfully sent off ten minutes in.

    Given all the pieces we have now, I'm a little worried that Herc Gomez was sent packing given that he and Vanney are supposed to be tight, but his productive history as a striker is somewhat overstated in MLS. It'll be interesting to me to see how he does if Giovinco is out for a few games or gone to WCQ and we have to change up our tactical look to suit personnel, rather than addressing our opponent's likely strengths and weaknesses.

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    This is why I've been preaching patience since the end of the 2014 season, when Vanney took over and the team was poor.

    Toronto FC was bad. Among the worst in the league. It was always going to take at least two full seasons to dump bloated deals and get in some quality pieces.

    Vanney has created a culture that didn't exist under Nelsen/Winter ...

    The players trust and respect him. He arguably works just as hard or harder than all of them.

    What I will say is the lack of depth in the attack is worrisome, but most teams in this league have deficiencies. Toronto's is a lack of strikers.

    There's something being overlooked, however. Something that could be putting pressure on president Bill Manning. I'll have more on this during the summer, potentially.

    Larson

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    Quote Originally Posted by T-boy View Post
    It just goes to show what happens when you stick to a plan for a couple of seasons and stick to a squad and build on it!
    Listen, the team seems to be on track right now, but it really did not have to take this long to implement the present system.

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    Quote Originally Posted by KurtLarSUN View Post

    There's something being overlooked, however. Something that could be putting pressure on president Bill Manning. I'll have more on this during the summer, potentially.

    Larson
    Talk about a teaser! You know we'll all be waiting for whatever you write on the team.
    MLS is a tough, physical league, that emphasizes speed, and features plastic fields, grueling travel, extreme weather, and incompetent refs. - NK Toronto

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    We are actually much better with both Gio and Jozy on the pitch.

    The combo forces a defense to not swarm a single player because though he is inconsistent Altidore is still a threat.


    We swarmed Drogba in Montreal, at one point you had 4 players around him. Other teams do similar things to Gio where you may have 1 or 2 guys on him at all times. We are scoring fewer goals in part because this year teams have stop Giovincio strategies, and in part we don't have Bradley on the attack. Which is actually a Worry that we don't have enough playmaking up front when using Bradley as a DM.

    In the first 7 games last season our Goal scorers were

    Altidore x4
    Giovinco x4 (3 assists)
    Findley
    Cheyrou (3 assists)
    Jackson

    11 total


    This year

    Giovinco x6 (2 assists)
    Delgado
    Perquis

    8 Total

    Though we are letting in many fewer goals, or offense is much less a team effort and more.. give Seba the ball and hope for the best while we bunker down. This is directly due to Vanney's win by 1 goal or tie strategy. It has paid off point wise but has actually lead to both loses. In fact in our last 5 games we have only scored 4 goals. Last season there was only 1 game in the opening road trip were we didn't score and we scored 2 or more goals in 4 of the 7.

    We still need to be able to score. Our offensive form has likely cost us 5 points, we really do need to find a balance. The sky isn't falling but if we lose Seba and Jozy for stretches where is our offense? If we lose Bradley where is our defense? All is not Roses and Gummie Bears. We are 15th in the league in Goals scored right now. We basically went from nearly the top scoring team and the team with the most goals against, to the team with the least goals against but nearly the least goals scored. Both can result in barely making the playoffs as it means every game is going to be a nail biter.
    Last edited by Kaz; 04-26-2016 at 07:47 AM.

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    I like that we started with a default 4-3-3 and then slowly transition to a 4-4-2 diamond as we get closer to home. The diamond is actually a variation to the 4-3-3 so Vanney was extremely smart with the team setup in preseason.

    Now I understand the Endoh aquisition a bit better as a hardworking shuttler. I also see players playing in their preferred spots like Oso at 10, Johnson as a shuttler, Bradley at 6 and then Seba and Altidore as forwards.

    Obviously forward is a problem of depth but Herc's contract comes off the books in June. If we trade a defender, that should give us enough space to bring in someone in time for the Euro.

  28. #58
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kaz View Post
    We are actually much better with both Gio and Jozy on the pitch.

    The combo forces a defense to not swarm a single player because though he is inconsistent Altidore is still a threat.


    We swarmed Drogba in Montreal, at one point you had 4 players around him. Other teams do similar things to Gio where you may have 1 or 2 guys on him at all times. We are scoring fewer goals in part because this year teams have stop Giovincio strategies, and in part we don't have Bradley on the attack. Which is actually a Worry that we don't have enough playmaking up front when using Bradley as a DM.

    In the first 7 games last season our Goal scorers were

    Altidore x4
    Giovinco x4 (3 assists)
    Findley
    Cheyrou (3 assists)
    Jackson

    11 total


    This year

    Giovinco x6 (2 assists)
    Delgado
    Perquis

    8 Total

    Though we are letting in many fewer goals, or offense is much less a team effort and more.. give Seba the ball and hope for the best while we bunker down. This is directly due to Vanney's win by 1 goal or tie strategy. It has paid off point wise but has actually lead to both loses. In fact in our last 5 games we have only scored 4 goals. Last season there was only 1 game in the opening road trip were we didn't score and we scored 2 or more goals in 4 of the 7.

    We still need to be able to score. Our offensive form has likely cost us 5 points, we really do need to find a balance. The sky isn't falling but if we lose Seba and Jozy for stretches where is our offense? If we lose Bradley where is our defense? All is not Roses and Gummie Bears. We are 15th in the league in Goals scored right now. We basically went from nearly the top scoring team and the team with the most goals against, to the team with the least goals against but nearly the least goals scored. Both can result in barely making the playoffs as it means every game is going to be a nail biter.
    This is a fair assessment, but I would argue that it is a great road strategy. Last year, we scored a lot of goals, but we had the worst defense in the league (or close to it). I'll take less scoring if it means more winning.
    Toronto FC baby...best team everrrrrrrrrr -Jozy

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    Quote Originally Posted by PopePouri View Post

    Obviously forward is a problem of depth but Herc's contract comes off the books in June. If we trade a defender, that should give us enough space to bring in someone in time for the Euro.
    If they want cover in for the Euros and Copa they will need to bring whoever that is before the primary transfer window closes on May11th.

    Euros are June 10th - July 10th
    Copa is June 3- June 26th

    Herc's contract comes off the books end of June.
    Secondary transfer window where TFC should have more budget flexibility opens on July 4th

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    Quote Originally Posted by Jack View Post
    This is a fair assessment, but I would argue that it is a great road strategy. Last year, we scored a lot of goals, but we had the worst defense in the league (or close to it). I'll take less scoring if it means more winning.
    I don't disagree beyond that all the other teams in the league have spent 8 weeks building attacking chemistry, while we have been playing a very defensive form a football.. not Preki Ball but still very defensive. It can work, so long as we don't loose any pieces. A injury her and a suspension there and we can fall apart because we aren't building that chemistry upfront. We have seen that with missed chances, and miscommunication.

    My hope is that it gets better... however we are getting close to a set of games where we are going to lose likely both our primary strikers.. It would be nice to find a balance. Of course teams in this league play very differently at home than away, So that may change once we get home more.. like I say the Sky isn't falling but it isn't all Roses and Gummie Bears. There are things I'm concerned about, which may fade away by the end of May or may be full worry by the end of June.

    This season will show what Vanney is capable off. He has everyone he could want really (minus striker depth) we need to be sitting in the top 3 of the east this year for this team to be a success. All that being said. I'm really pleased with the start of this season point wise.. I just wish they were a little hungry offensively. There is a balance that can be struck. We are supposed to have a League MVP and Golden Boot winner, and nearly the guy with the top assists last year. we should be more of an offensive threat. It is a concern.

 

 

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