A few thoughts on recent matches
We have had a very difficult stretch of four matches since the April international break, with three away games and one midweek game. Winning three and losing one is a very good result.
The first two victories came against truly quality opponents. The away victory against Angel City featured one of the most intense midfield contests I have ever witnessed at the club level. The victory against San Diego indicated that the new front four, plus Fleming occasionally stepping up, probably gave us the best high-press setup in the entire league.
One shared characteristic of those two hard-earned victories was our very high intensity. We contested 50/50 balls, tackled hard, and brought a lot of physicality. However, due to consecutive high-intensity games, our stamina situation had become worrying since last weekend. Chicago has a roster that is not very competitive, and we were somewhat lucky to secure a third win.
The situation was no longer tenable in the recent loss against Racing. Racing are a very physical team, and their home games always feature extremely high intensity. Unfortunately, because of our critical stamina condition and probably because we were not fully prepared for their intensity, we simply could not match their level. We kept losing 50/50 balls everywhere and kept getting disrupted in the build-up.
This loss also exposed the importance of Coffey. Fleming is very good at man-marking and tackling, and her coverage is incredible. Overall she is not a significant downgrade purely defense-wise even compared to Coffey. But her ability to shake off defenders and break the lines of pressure is far inferior to Coffey’s. She also does not contribute equally to offense in the final third. Bogere had an incredibly good defensive match against Angel City, but her level has declined recently, and her fitness appears to be problematic. Two things are probably connected. Getting used to NWSL intensity can be very challenging.
Naturally, due to this stretch of games being extremely difficult, we started to have depth issues. Turner cannot go beyond halftime, Bogere needs to be subbed off in the early 50s, and Tordin cannot go beyond 65 minutes. These unplanned substitutions hurt our ability to fight for a better result today.
Moreover, I am also curious about the rationale for subbing on Castellanos and making her one of the two pivots instead of dropping Moultrie deeper. Castellanos is weak physically and was dispossessed twice in the backfield in the roughly 40 minutes she played, with almost no positive contribution. Moultrie and Tordin were the only two players today who could win on-ball duels in the central areas of the pitch. Taking off Tordin may have been necessary for fitness reasons, but it definitely made the situation worse. Tordin has also been pinned into deeper defensive positions recently. This may be the price she and the team need to pay to ensure that she and Sophie can both start, but her impact can only be maximized if she has frequent opportunities to enter the penalty area.
The two center-backs were pretty poor, but I don’t blame them too much. Calzada was not prepared for the opponent’s intensity, and she should have been more decisive. The first goal was preventable if she had stepped up earlier and more assertively. Hiatt has experience, but overall she is not a very good defender. Don’t get me wrong: she is not a terrible defender who should never see the pitch. We had one defender who fit that description two seasons ago. But it is also not a good idea to count on her to be the backbone of our back line.
For the second goal conceded, Arnold made a wrong judgment and should bear some blame. Still, she was vital in our previous three victories and has played very well overall this season. I hope this mistake will not affect her future performance.