I've had some time to think about last night, and it did produce a headache, and while the game is implemented by the players, the match was lost before ever taking the field. PV really screwed up on many many levels.
1. He needed to squash any Arsenal rumors immediately. Take that distraction away from the team and players. I had to watch a college football coach (Jimbo Fisher) dance around job rumors for the last 3 years, and it always affected the program and players, culminating in the shit-show of a season they just had because he let rumors linger all year before finally taking the job. Not dispelling rumors kills the locker room because players don't know if the coach is committed or has one foot out the door. NYCFC's players will always say the right thing, that the Arsenal news/rumors had no effect on them, but that's just savvy responses to questions that keep them out of the club's PR doghouse.
2. Coach's decision regarding player fatigue. That's the reason given for not starting Medina and Herrera last night, since evidently they haven't looked sharp in practice and PV attributes Shradi-Tajores' injury to over-use. I buy that and believe it's totally legitimate. However, it really shows that PV let things get too far before taking action. We have a deep squad, but not yet a talented squad that can maintain first-11 quality when inserting multiple second-11 players. Unless a match is against Atlanta/Toronto/SKC or another top team, he should be rotating 1 second-11 guy into the starting roster as a precautionary measure; I'm not even sure we can handle doing 2 guys rotated in, but by constantly doing 1, it's giving guys a break every 7ish weeks. Obviously injuries will also dictate this. Yesterday, we couldn't handle having both Medina and Herrera sit out. Had either have gotten a rest in the last few weeks, then perhaps only one would have needed to sit.
3. Squad rotation - using the entire squad. Yesterday had only one offensive sub on the roster. One. That's malpractice on PV's part, and it's not the first time he's hamstrung the team with his bench. Lewis should have made the bench; for whatever reasons PV has him in the doghouse, it shouldn't be at the expense of the team. Our forwards we bad yesterday - they had zero movement. Medina needed to come on as did another attacking player, but the only "real" options on the bench were TMac and Herrera. TMac didn't look bad since he didn't need to run/chase, and Herrera should have come on earlier to add some muscle and height. But even with those two showing better than the starters, the offense needed a second (if not a third) spark in the attack. At what point does the club tell PV enough is enough and stop tying your hands before the opening kickoff???? There were matches last year when Mix could have been used instead of Mikey, and yesterday Lewis should have started over Wallace (if Medina wasn't going to start).
3a. Tinner also looked tired, considering his bad touches. For a guy that always goes 110percent, has he needed a break with SAS getting a few minutes. Hindsight is 20/20, but with Portland bunkering yesterday, SAS would have been a good alternative.
4. PV needs to stop inserting players like he's playing Playstation FIFA. The Role Herrera plays is that of a strong tackler and holding outlet. Ofori's style isn't that - he's hesitant to throw his body into challenges. Playing him there was just wrong; either play Ring or Maxi as the #8 with Ofori taking their spot. Same with Wallace - he's not a talented attacker, he's a defensive, fore-checking attacker that is there to harass - the guy hasn't scored in 11 months and based on his miss yesterday, he may not ever score again even facing an open net from 5 feet away. Considering the way we play, Wallace can never be inserted at the wing if the goal is creativity - his role should really be to help close out matches when the other team is chasing and he can harass.
5. PV needs to do a better job of in-match instructions. So many times the team would be attacking down the left side, with the ball deep and Mata would kill the play because he'd refuse to push it forward to either Berget or another player moving into the corner; instead choosing to pull it back to towards midfield and Callens. One time, fine. Twice, ok. Three times, and Mata is just protecting possession. But it kept happening over and over and over, and PV didn't do anything about it. I don't know what was going through Mata's head, but it wasn't offense because he never took anybody on, and if he's not using his speed and technical ability, then he has zero place on the field (because he sure wasn't playing defense yesterday since Callens was having to cover the left time and again). And I put Mata's shit show on PV for not changing things up or giving him new instructions. Hell, if he wasn't going to attack from the FB position, and PV wasn't willing to sub him, then push him up as a wing to occupy a defender and spread the defense - something, anything to make Portland rethink their tactics. Or even move him into the middle of the field to carry the ball forward with speed right up the middle spine. But no, it was always a pass back to Callens.
6. Substitutions. There's no rule that subs have to be made at 60+ minutes. When the team looks bad, stir things up at 45min. Sends a message and it gives the subs a chance to integrate themselves into the match. 60min is cutting it close to get the necessary amount of touches that a guy like Medina needs. How much impact can Herrera make when he only gets 11 minutes? 3rd year in and PV still doesn't have a feel for the subs.
7. Tactics. We saw against Atlanta that when Maxi is deep, nothing happens, but when high he's able to ignite the attack. Why was he dropping deep from the get-go? It's like PV doesn't learn from matches about what works and what fundamentally doesn't. He can try to shove a square peg into a round hole a million times, but it's never going to fit, and if by some miracle it does, it's an aberration from wearing down the edges/corners, not because of a stroke of genius. and further, if possession for the sake of possession isn't working, what's Plan B???? Does the team ever practice for a Plan B????? I feel like Pep has a Plan B that he pulls out at times, not many because almost never needed, so why doesn't PV????
Ulrich, you hit on every thought I had about this game. Every single one. I did not feel like typing all of that on twitter yesterday when discussing the game with D_RoyJenkins .
