Hamilton was decent first half, terrible second half lots of poor decisions.
Hamilton was decent first half, terrible second half lots of poor decisions.
Scheduled loss, so the result is what it is.
Fraser was great on the ball, had a bit of trouble in the tackle. He's a good player though.
Aketxe will come good eventually. He's talented and I'll always bet on talent.
Best thing about this game is Bradley coming away with 0 minutes played. On to Chivas.
Thought Chapman was good in the first half but sort of disappeared in the second, same with Hamilton.
Irwin and Moor were half asleep for the opening goal, Irwin wasn't even close to the middle of his net hence why he wasn't even close on a savable shot.
I think what the TFC braintrust likes about having TFCII is that they are fully integrated in the setup at the training ground. Allows them to have full control on their development. Did Columbus not run into problems with loaning players to their USL affiliate and the coach there not playing them?Originally Posted by Detroit_TFC
Remember The Man, The Legend, The Goal 5-12-07 and All That #9 Left On The Pitch, Thanks For The Memories !!!
How did the coaching staff keep him on the bench? Duct tape? He must have been doing insane.
That's a risk. Just seems to me TFC II is more like the old reserve squad set up than a quality USL side (ie all development, not much competitive success).
No sense in over reacting to a loss that was on the cards today. Ten changes and an away fixture at altitude meant it was always going to huge ask for TFC get anything out of today’s game. However, the worrying thing for me was our lack of cover in forward positions. Much has been made of the depth of our squad and rightly so, but whilst I’m comfotable with the replacement we have for the first team squad in defence and midfield, our striking options is a different kettle of fish. It strikes me that if we have to go without Giovinco or Altidore we are struggling. Ricketts is the best substitute option but he is some 2ay behind our two regular strikers. He might do fine in partnership with one of them for the last 15-20 minutes of a game, but on his own he lacks the quality to lead the line. This problem is compounded with the fact that Hamilton and Spencer are even further behind in quality than Ricketts. At least the Canadian international has pace on his side. I see nothing in the play of Hamilton and Spencer to suggest they can be regular MLS starting players. So perhaps the lesson from today’s defeat is to look at strengthening the forward positions in the transfer window, for if we have to go any length of time without both Séba and Jozy we will struggle to find the net.
I was also also extremely disappointed in Aketxe’s contribution today. It’s early days and he obviously needs playing time, but he’s no straight replacement for Vazquez that’s for sure. Today was his chance to prove it and he came up well short. Hopefully in time he can prove me wrong but the early signs are not positive. EDIT: Having just watched the Portland/Minnesota game, if its true we were chasing Darwin Quintero along with Minnesota we should have pulled out all the stops to get him. He looks like he would have been far value for our TAM than Aketxe. His acquisition would not only have solved the depth problem up front but he would have provided competition for Giovinco and Altidore for a first team place. (perhaps even complimenting them by playing alongside in a wide role) With Vazquez, Ososrio, Delgado, Chapman, and Hassler fighting for two places alongside Bradley in midfield, in not convinced we needed an extra player there as much as we need more quality up front. However, no use crying over spilled milk.
Anyway, although we cannot afford to disregard MLS play completely we all know Tuesday is the game that really matters, so let’s put today behind us and take another step towards the real immediate goal, champions of Concacaf.
Onwards and upwards TFC... onwards to victory!!!
Last edited by General Woolfe; 04-15-2018 at 12:01 AM.
Yes of course you had to rest all the players they did with the first game of the final on Tuesday night, Chivas did the same thing last night losing 3-0 in their league game to Tijuana . The only negative is that guys like Chapman, Hamilton and Aketxe did not impress unfortunately.
3/5th's of the way to meeting our total amount of losses from last year.
I'd be interesting to see if all of those people who thought we'd repeat the shield and do even better points wise this year still think that.
Chapman and Hamilton were solid if unspectacular I thought. You also have to figure in that each of the guys on the field will look better with the starting lineup. Good for all of them to get minutes regardless.
Akexte is the Basque John Bostock.
Last edited by molenshtain; 04-14-2018 at 04:42 PM.
I guess that by the end of our CCL run we'll be so much behind the best in East, that no matter how well we'll do in the remaining games, we'll have the chance to catch only the 3-4 th spot in East at the end of the regular season.
The biggest difference is that you have a full blown academy now unlike the days of the joke MLS reserve league where a number of teams did not take it seriously. I honestly believe that wins and losses are not a priority when it comes to the MLS2 sides that are playing in the USL. Its a double edge sword as you can see that both Montreal and Vancouver both scrapped their USL sides after a few seasons. But I think from their perspective they factored in some commercial success to some extent with there respective 2 teams.
Remember The Man, The Legend, The Goal 5-12-07 and All That #9 Left On The Pitch, Thanks For The Memories !!!
Once you win the shield, it's not such a big deal. Winning CONCACAF and possibly going further are way better accomplishments, particularly since we've never gone this far before. It's the MLS Cup that puts stars on our logo, so as long as we get enough points/wins to make it to the playoffs this year that's all we'll need to have a good chance at getting another Cup.
I'we seen nothing yet from Aketxe which gives hope he'll worth to be a starter at any time this year.
Funny thing is that from the big 3 signings before this season, the order of importance looked: Aketxe, VDW and Auro, but by now they turned out exatly in the opposite order:
Auro by far the best signing, VDW not super, but what we have expected, and Aketxe being a miss so far.
Winning the Shield means you play the Cup at home - it's a massive advantage in the strange MLS Cup format. Totally not giving up on winning the SS yet. We won't be able to draw anhy games this year - will have to go on a rampage once CONCACAF is in the bag.
The main concern from today is that maybe we are not as deep as we thought we are. Ricketts has gone backwards & if he doesn't get his head sorted he is in trouble. His first touch has been abysmal. Aketexe - that fierce left foot is going to burst a net soon. Missing that chance today is a big dissapointment - he had the chance to lead that group of youngsters and get a result. Hamilton was OK - but he has been better.
Key issue was resting the team and no injuries for those that couldn't be rested.
It's not reasonable to have expected much of anything today. The league isn't that shitty. I hope this group of guys can get a draw in Houston, that's going to be even tougher. Almost certainly another loss coming there. Can't be helped.
I just... don’t care about the shield. At all.
1) We already won it.
2) Mostly, shield winners don’t win MLS Cup.
3) If we have to play any western team on the road in a winner take all final game, I could care less. We would be the favorite, and I don’t care what the standings say. Could be a fun road trip!
It isn’t, and shouldn’t be, a priority for us.
Last edited by ensco; 04-14-2018 at 05:21 PM.
“What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”
So two games started, and Aketxe is already the new John Bostock even though he created more chances than the rest of the team put together out there. Okay then
He was playing as our #10 and we played two forwards as wingers with Ben Spencer as our striker. Who else was supposed to be creating chances?
Aketxe needs first team time to show what he has got. It took Vazquez a couple of months.
Not saying Aketxe is good or bad, just saying it’s not possible to say when you throw him out there with the reserves. At altitude.
(Aketxe will never get a real shot at unless we move one of Osorio or Delgado. So he may be gone in the summer.)
Why does anyone think Colorado are crap? Can we have a reality check here? They are no joke, they have had a strong start, and they played our full lineup, including Vazquez, Mavinga and Morrow, even, in 3 of the 4 halves of football we played them in 6 weeks ago.
That is as good or better than Tigres or America did against us, and we had depleted lineups against those teams.
“What the world needs is more geniuses with humility; there are so few of us left.”
I agree 100%
This was a game that no one expected to win easily and likely was going to be a loss. It is ok. It actually wasn't that bad. A group of players who have never really played togeather like that, thrown togeather over a weekend.
The error to me was not preping this and having this group on the training field for the last week or two working together. I think if they had had more time to know one another this could have actually been a win... which... I hate saying it... is a comment on Colorado not us.
Well yeah, he created chances but the forwards couldn't capitalize. Also managed to get a quality shot off despite the forwards not being threatening enough at any point to draw defenders. As the #10 his job was to create chances and he actually did a good job of it. If we had a decent striker instead of BS we might have gone into the halftime break with a goal because of it. Comparisons to that headless chicken are unwarranted. He might appear a bit out of it defensively but he's clearly capable of creating quality goalscoring opportunities
I was one of those people and I definitely don't think that anymore. It bothers me that we are having to (willingly) sacrifice so much in MLS to attempt to win the CCL, but I guess it's necessary. I mean, if everyone at the club thinks we need to do this to win the CCL, I have to trust them. They know better than me.
It's just disappointing.
Blame the uniforms!!!!
CCL > Shield.
we just knocked off Tigers and America. We don't need to prove ourselves to Colorado and Co. in MLS. This is a lot bigger than the Shield right now. Enjoy the ride!!
This makeshift squad probably could have done much better if they had trained together. It's probably too much of an ask to have Vanney manage a second squad just for a couple of matches results, though. Good as he is, he's a human being and can't work 25 hours a day.
Maybe they can learn from this, as they've learned from everything else and have someone else manage a B squad for occasions like this. It's going to come up every year if TFC keeps winning.
It's not how you start, but rather how you finish that matters. I didn't really expect TFC to win today, given the lineup they put out, and I don't expect them to win next Saturday in Houston. At this moment, the CONCACAF Championship is all that should matter. Once that gets settled - i.e., winning the trophy - then they should be back to their kickass ways in no time.
TORONTO FC, 2017 MLS CHAMPIONS!!! (Still the greatest in league history!)
Man some of you guys are super harsh. This was a patched-up lineup thrown out there to hopefully compete and they did. Aketxe was the focal point of the attack, despite Colorado marking him heavily he still managed some key passes and scoring chances. He had no space, when he lines up next to the first team he would look much better. Put Osorio out there tonight he would have done the same or less. Just like when Osorio he played with the 2nd team vs Ottawa.
Indeed, that's quite likely. Though Aketxe is our fourth highest paid player now, ahead of all our other midfielders except Bradley. He needs to prove he can make the players around him better, which is what a good playmaker does.
I don't at all see him being the type of Player that Vazquez is, and he can't do what Osorio or Delgado (or even Hasler) do in the role beside him. I don't know what the point of him is. If we frequently played in a 5 man midfield I'd understand the change of pace he'd give you, but outside of that i'm not really sure what he can give us. I'd be happy to be proven wrong, and that's entirely possible given how early in the season it is, but for know i'm pretty unenthusiastic. We'll see.
Outside of that I don't think anyone is unhappy with today. Good to give the kids a run. Not much else to take away.
Last edited by molenshtain; 04-14-2018 at 10:05 PM.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote