I love playoff games in March. That’s what it felt like at the stadium. Whew!
MLS - March 16 - Toronto (Home - YS)
- Thread starter LionNYC
- Start date
Crazy game to attend. As a new fan I have some thoughts on Cushing and the team.
I’m on the fence about this whole Cushing Out movement. Tonight we watched this team play hard for something like 800 minutes with stoppage time. They were fighting and you could see how badly they wanted the win. Instead of caving after the early goal they fought even harder.
The substitutions tonight were good and made sense when they happened. Cushing didn’t immediately go into turtle mode but kept enough attacking players out there to be dangerous until we were in the 80s.
I think the biggest concern is the predictability of the attack and the ball movement. I was turning to my son during the game and calling the passes 3 ahead. The only times I saw Toronto confused was when we switched it up and came up through the middle. The ball doesn’t spend enough time at the feet of our attacking/creative players and there is too much back and forth between our CB and RB. Maybe there is a method to that madness I’m not seeing but it feels like we only have 2 plays to move the ball up the field unless Santi, Parks or Sands gets the ball early enough and becomes a wild card.
It feels like there will be a lot of grind it out games where we get fortunate with our finishes. We’re not surprising anyone.
I’m on the fence about this whole Cushing Out movement. Tonight we watched this team play hard for something like 800 minutes with stoppage time. They were fighting and you could see how badly they wanted the win. Instead of caving after the early goal they fought even harder.
The substitutions tonight were good and made sense when they happened. Cushing didn’t immediately go into turtle mode but kept enough attacking players out there to be dangerous until we were in the 80s.
I think the biggest concern is the predictability of the attack and the ball movement. I was turning to my son during the game and calling the passes 3 ahead. The only times I saw Toronto confused was when we switched it up and came up through the middle. The ball doesn’t spend enough time at the feet of our attacking/creative players and there is too much back and forth between our CB and RB. Maybe there is a method to that madness I’m not seeing but it feels like we only have 2 plays to move the ball up the field unless Santi, Parks or Sands gets the ball early enough and becomes a wild card.
It feels like there will be a lot of grind it out games where we get fortunate with our finishes. We’re not surprising anyone.
I found it funny that Keaton called out a bunch of young players about not being able to play with a lead last week, then did THAT this week.
Outside of the early goal, I really liked the way that we played tonight, even when we were down man. More direct in the attack, a few really nice possessions, that outside of the left foot assist on KOT's goal... *chef's kiss*
Let's hope it's a turning point. I'm optimistic tonight (so I won't be mentioning all of TFC's missing pieces...).
It's good to be back in a New York Groove.
Outside of the early goal, I really liked the way that we played tonight, even when we were down man. More direct in the attack, a few really nice possessions, that outside of the left foot assist on KOT's goal... *chef's kiss*
Let's hope it's a turning point. I'm optimistic tonight (so I won't be mentioning all of TFC's missing pieces...).
It's good to be back in a New York Groove.
Glad to get a win.
And, I know it is snark, but a dream game for Cushing with all the defensive substitutions and low block the second half.
And, I know it is snark, but a dream game for Cushing with all the defensive substitutions and low block the second half.
Crowd sounded really loud tonight on TV. Great atmosphere for a game in March.
The best-case scenario for us is a turnaround, even with Cushing at the helm. So I'm very glad he got the result tonight. We need a result in these next two road games before the homestand starts.
When Santi is on his game, he's DP level. Just needs to reach that level more consistently.
I've never seen a striker shoot so many shots right into the goalie as Mounsef Bakrar. I'm over him starting -- I need to see Jovan in the XI next week. Even if he can only give 50 minutes, start Jovan. That's also two straight DNP's for Ojeda -- we need to get him into some games, too.
Two yellow cards in three games speaks to a team that's trying -- maybe trying a little too hard. I'll say this for Nick -- the players are still playing for him. They still want it. Awful moment for Keaton, though.
Hopefully this is the start of a turnaround in results, though the next three games are going to be really hard.
The best-case scenario for us is a turnaround, even with Cushing at the helm. So I'm very glad he got the result tonight. We need a result in these next two road games before the homestand starts.
When Santi is on his game, he's DP level. Just needs to reach that level more consistently.
I've never seen a striker shoot so many shots right into the goalie as Mounsef Bakrar. I'm over him starting -- I need to see Jovan in the XI next week. Even if he can only give 50 minutes, start Jovan. That's also two straight DNP's for Ojeda -- we need to get him into some games, too.
Two yellow cards in three games speaks to a team that's trying -- maybe trying a little too hard. I'll say this for Nick -- the players are still playing for him. They still want it. Awful moment for Keaton, though.
Hopefully this is the start of a turnaround in results, though the next three games are going to be really hard.
Yes, Less passing to the keeper and enough penalty hunting.
Is it possible, even considering “finishing is a streaky thing”, that Bakrar just isn’t really that good at that part of the job?
Kinda feels like Hannes could be league leader in assists if we had a Cucho, Bouange, Benteke, Joveljic, Suarez, Pukki…
Funny, I thought the crowd was really quiet for its size. Maybe because I’ve gotten used to Citi, which is much louder.
This match felt like a turning point for Santi.
This is the first time I’ve felt like he assumed the leadership role that has been missing (Maxi aside) since Taty and Tinner left. He’s shown signs of i,t but from early in in the match he was everywhere he needed to be. He kept it up all match, drew fouls in dangerous positions and most importantly, kept his cool.
Congrats to K O’T for opening his account on St. Patty’s day and that Julian ball in was one of the prettiest passes I’ve seen in the history of this team, but Santi was my MOTM tonight.
That was pretty bad. But maybe it's the price we have to pay at this point. Discipline comes after desire in the normal course of things, and if it's the other way around, desire usually doesn't come at all.
So, I'm glad we're fighting. And the team unity is really encouraging. So is our ability to win in an ugly scrap, especially after the way we got thrown off our game in St. Louis, and then squandered a really good opening 35 minutes against Portland.
We have solidity. That's a precious commodity in a long season.
Same here. Even watching from afar, I could tell he was talking to everyone in pregame, showing leadership. And then he went out and led on the pitch. Kept his cool when things got chippy, too. He was great today.
I noticed at half when tempers were flaring, over what I do not know, Santi was trying to keep it from escalating. Unreal. Would be incredible to see this version carry forward.
Right? If he's like this from now on, it's a very short step to “disciplina sem arregimentação” (discipline without regimentation). We could get good in a hurry.
I continue to be impressed with perera. He looked sharp yesterday and made a number of key plays to help kill off the game after the red. Excited to see a sands perera pairing next week.
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had a night to digest the game.
santi motm for me. had a great game. kept his emotions in check but was still showing his passion and energy for the full 90+. Santi needs to share his secrets with Parks, who needs to get his chill back. dude is feeling the pressure of taking on leadership, i think, and he's lost his mojo. i want the parks that used to glide around the field with the ball stuck to his foot, making slick passes. not the one with heavy touches, stupid fouls, and complaining to the ref every call. I really think he needs to relax.
overall, we fought well to come back and win. i hope it continues and improves.
watching the highlights, it seems to me that wolf and bakrar get in each other's way a lot. they don't seem to know what the other is doing or don't know what they should be doing in the position they're playing. but if they can get that sorted out, or if jovan can perform better in this sense, i think it will improve our attack. i look forward to seeing jovan get a start too.
we need to work on our long ball defending. martins and risa both need to pay more attention and communicate. the way we play, they are often isolated and we rely on them to get the job done. martins has decent enough speed that he should be able to handle long balls with some anticipation and positioning. but the key will be communication with risa and freese.
halftime - from the highlight video, i could see insigne say something over to our bench and, i think an assistant coach (or player?) runs over to him and they get into an argument and that's where it starts?
here's replay of the incident. MLS says it was words between insigne and cushing.
anyway - it seemed to give the boys a bit of fire in the 2nd half and no one got carded so it's all good.
bravo to our guys for keeping both insigne and bernadeschi in check. neither of them were able to grab hold of the game and do what they wanted.
Thought the ref was decent in that he called fouls, but was terrible in deciding when to give cards. Akinola should have gotten a card for unnecessarily sliding into freese. Yellow at minimum, but I could totally see it being given a red since it was an obvious slide after the play was over, right into freese's ankles. A few other situations where players deserved cards on both sides, but none were shown. It definitely got wild and crazy out there. At least he was somewhat consistent, which is all we can ask for?
santi motm for me. had a great game. kept his emotions in check but was still showing his passion and energy for the full 90+. Santi needs to share his secrets with Parks, who needs to get his chill back. dude is feeling the pressure of taking on leadership, i think, and he's lost his mojo. i want the parks that used to glide around the field with the ball stuck to his foot, making slick passes. not the one with heavy touches, stupid fouls, and complaining to the ref every call. I really think he needs to relax.
overall, we fought well to come back and win. i hope it continues and improves.
watching the highlights, it seems to me that wolf and bakrar get in each other's way a lot. they don't seem to know what the other is doing or don't know what they should be doing in the position they're playing. but if they can get that sorted out, or if jovan can perform better in this sense, i think it will improve our attack. i look forward to seeing jovan get a start too.
we need to work on our long ball defending. martins and risa both need to pay more attention and communicate. the way we play, they are often isolated and we rely on them to get the job done. martins has decent enough speed that he should be able to handle long balls with some anticipation and positioning. but the key will be communication with risa and freese.
halftime - from the highlight video, i could see insigne say something over to our bench and, i think an assistant coach (or player?) runs over to him and they get into an argument and that's where it starts?
here's replay of the incident. MLS says it was words between insigne and cushing.
anyway - it seemed to give the boys a bit of fire in the 2nd half and no one got carded so it's all good.
bravo to our guys for keeping both insigne and bernadeschi in check. neither of them were able to grab hold of the game and do what they wanted.
Thought the ref was decent in that he called fouls, but was terrible in deciding when to give cards. Akinola should have gotten a card for unnecessarily sliding into freese. Yellow at minimum, but I could totally see it being given a red since it was an obvious slide after the play was over, right into freese's ankles. A few other situations where players deserved cards on both sides, but none were shown. It definitely got wild and crazy out there. At least he was somewhat consistent, which is all we can ask for?
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I've noticed two things from these scab refs:
1. They don't really want to do anything that will impact the game. Penalties, red cards, offside decisions seem to be going to VAR way more often than normal. They're making the safe call, then allowing VAR to correct them.
2. It seems like MLS is trying to get VAR to interfere less over these last two weeks. We saw it in our game last week when there was controversy. Obviously the Parks red card was so blatant they had to call it, but it wouldn't surprise me if MLS is trying to use VAR less so they can claim the referees are doing a good job. The first two weeks, VAR usage was way up over normal and they don't want that. It'll make their negotiations with the real refs harder if we all see how bad the scab refs are doing.
The elbow thrown in the Montreal Chicago game was so subtle nobody saw it. Only the 2 players involved had any idea. Fans didn't see it. Announcers were clueless. VAR intervened and changed the game completely.
Last week's conspiracy was the league refused to show replays. This week we saw plenty of them. Was it a course correction? Did we actually see the same level of replays last week and this week? Nobody knows.
I might take the criticism of the replacement refs seriously if fans hadn't spent the last decade criticizing the regular refs in exactly the same way. (and if PL fans didn't talk the same about their refs, and so on): "It just seems"... "I've noticed [something unverifiable]".
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yea i don't really think it's a scab ref thing. i think this is just refs. if they were missing blatant calls left and right, then sure, i could blame these scab refs cause it would SEEM like they are worse than normal PRO refs, but that doesn't seem to be the case. we, as fans, will always jump on the ref if they aren't calling the game the way we see it or want to see it.
I think the ref last night was fairly consistent. he didn't give a lot of cards out over the game, but he did that for both sides. while I may not agree with that, it is what it is.
I've seen refs in other MLS games calling PKs and such w/o VAR. both our red cards were things that any ref would miss in life play because it was very subtle (sands) or it happens too quickly (parks).
Easily the most complete 90 minute performance this brief season and better than all but a handful last season. I think we might have dominated Portland over 30-40 minutes last week more than we did any stretch yesterday, but this was a more consistent beginning to end effort.
The players are committed and playing very hard. When the game was nearly over they were pumped and inciting the supporter section. I see no signs Nick has lost their respect. Maybe they're going all out in spite of it, as pros should, but often they don't.
I love when someone like O'Toole not only does something great but makes it look like the most natural thing in the world. Like why can't he do it more often? Except I played sports and had very extremely occasional moments like that and absolutely could not do it more often.
I don't see how Bakrar was offside in Minute 52.
Bakrar works very hard but his shots consistently lack pace, like he expects the ball to be lighter than it is or something.
Anything else I've got is repetitive of others.
The players are committed and playing very hard. When the game was nearly over they were pumped and inciting the supporter section. I see no signs Nick has lost their respect. Maybe they're going all out in spite of it, as pros should, but often they don't.
I love when someone like O'Toole not only does something great but makes it look like the most natural thing in the world. Like why can't he do it more often? Except I played sports and had very extremely occasional moments like that and absolutely could not do it more often.
I don't see how Bakrar was offside in Minute 52.
Bakrar works very hard but his shots consistently lack pace, like he expects the ball to be lighter than it is or something.
Anything else I've got is repetitive of others.
This may be the most important takeaway of all at this stage.
I was also puzzled by the 52 min offside call. There was only 1 camera angle, but he looked to be 2 yards behind the defender
