Vancouver learns the hard way that stuff happens in the playoffs
There will be temptation for fans and pundits throughout the MLS playoffs to view an entire team’s season through the tiny, smeared lens of a single knockout result. Yet the Vancouver Whitecaps’ controversial early elimination against FC Dallas on Wednesday is a great example of why that’s a bad idea.
Not that coach Carl Robinson’s Vancouver Whitecaps were entirely without tactical fault in their 2-1 wildcard loss to FC Dallas. A few line-up juggles, including not starting Russell Teibert, didn’t work as planned. Even so, Vancouver were still good enough to equalize through Erik Hurtado’s lucky strike in the 62nd minute.
Yet all the match preparation in the world can’t save a team from something like referee Mark Geiger’s bewildering 82nd minute decision to award Dallas a penalty for handball by Vancouver defender Kendall Waston. Despite clearly moving his hands away from the ball, and in the process making perhaps the most incidental of brushes against its surface, Waston was penalized. Michel converted the spot kick, and Vancouver were out.
Fans can talk about the need for more regular postseason experience, but the Caps outshot Dallas 11-8, with four shots on target to FCD’s 2. Vancouver were good enough for at least a draw. Despite the penalty and the loss, Robinson should go home proud of what he and his team accomplished, with a team that, with dynamic attacking players like Kekuta Manneh, Pedro Morales and Mauro Rosales (if they can keep them all) could be good enough to both make the playoffs and avoid the single game play-in next season.
FC Dallas will need to improve home form
For a team with a solid record at home this season, FC Dallas haven’t exactly looked their best recently at Toyota Stadium. After a 0-2 loss to the Portland Timbers which forced Wednesday’s play-in game against the Vancouver Whitecaps, FC Dallas were staring at extra time with the score tied 1-1 until the referee made “one of those calls” against Kendall Waston.
Still, Dallas got the win, but the Caps may have helped Dallas’ cause in the early going with what MLSsoccer.com’s Matthew Doyle noted was an ineffective long-ball strategy, an odd choice for coach Carl Robinson, particularly as the Portland Timbers had demonstrated only a week earlier with a 0-2 win over FCD how well a counter-attacking approach can work against coach Oscar Pareja’s team.
Sounders coach Sigi Schmid will no doubt be aware of Dallas’s vulnerability on the break, and will certainly look to finish off Dallas early in the first of their home and away series this weekend. Star player Fabian Castillo has already been effectively marked out of play for two games running, though Schmid may be worried the often porous Seattle defense won’t be able to handle the pace of players like Tesho Akindele and Mauro Diaz, particularly with the skill and ability of the latter returning to the lineup after two and a half months out with a bad knee. It was Diaz after all who calmly found Tesho on the other side of the edge of the 18 after a swift counter, which forced Vancouver to play on the front foot for much of the game.
Still, Dallas will need to find a way to match an often physical defense without it coming at the expense of more attacking options going forward. That may leave them vulnerable to Obafemi Martins and Clint Dempsey, but it may be better for Pareja to work on regaining home field advantage instead of hoping for a bit of good luck in the away leg at CenturyLink.
KC can’t escape their end-of-season woes
For a while, it looked like coach Peter Vermes would slough off a disappointing latter part of the season and show some of that 2013 MLS Cup winning magic. After all, considering how the 2014 season started, it was faintly incredible that SKC even had to make the trip to Harrison, New Jersey for the wildcard game at all.
Sporting had been in the mix for a Supporters Shield run as recently as late August. Then the wheels came off ,following a four game losing streak. Since August 19, Sporting KC managed 13 points from 14 games, posting a 4-1-9 record, with some major problems in defense. They managed to cling to second for a while but the losses kept coming, four straight to finish out the season.
Make that five. Though it looked for a few moments that Peter Vermes had picked the Red Bulls lock, particularly when Benny Feilhaber picked up a bobbled pass pick up from the feet of Eric Alexander to run at goal and perfectly pick out Dom Dwyer, some major issues reared their head at the back.
Though Henry’s vision and precision in picking out Bradley Wright-Phillips for the equalizer can be forgiven, the winner, scored in the 90th minute, was a defensive nightmare. A ballooning, mussed up cross from Ambroise Oyongo Bitolo on the right side of goal managed to find a Wright-Phillips completely unmarked, with Aurelien Collin and Matt Besler in an inexplicable reverie at the critical moment.
There are no pat solutions in football but Peter Vermes (or someone?) will have his work cut out in repaving the backline ahead of 2015’s move to the highly competitive Western Conference.
Thierry Henry quietly shows his importance to New York’s MLS Cup hopes
Thierry Henry – angry at his teammates, the refs, the sky, himself – appeared set to spend what might have been his final MLS game as man coming to terms with the failure of those around him to match his perfectionist ideal. Here were the Red Bulls, losing at home to a weakened and tired Sporting KC. Though not exactly to blame, Henry’s pass to Eric Alexander put the latter player in an awkward position with two men on and he flubbed it, letting Benny Feilhaber run on his way to an assist. This moment too came after some missed chances for himself, Tim Cahill and Bradley Wright-Phillips.
Yet there was Henry, running to the edge of the goal-line with a textbook cutback to find Bradley Wright-Phillips to equalize. There was Henry with 109 touches, three shots and several brilliant final passes. Henry can’t unlearn the technical ability and footballing intelligence that still makes him invaluable to the Red Bull’s chances, and will be key against Eastern Conference title holders DC United this weekend. Though BWP earned the accolades for the brace to add to his record-matching 27 regular season goals, Henry yet again did his job, and New York advanced.
Mike Petke’s approach will need work, but his side adjusted well in the second half. Though the Red Bulls looked stretched at times in the early going, they managed to use the width of the pitch to open up what had until then looked a packed defensive third for SKC in the second half.
But knockout tournaments are often about single moments as they are about tactics. One recalls Zinedine Zidane, Henry’s old France teammate, who in his last games in the World Cup showed his old brilliance until losing his cool in the final. The Red Bulls will need a similar display from Henry if they hope to finally win an MLS Cup with a France and Arsenal legend still on the team.
