“But it might go wrong”
Photo by Elizabeth Shaw
Match Haiku
A mild spring evening
Yields a welcome early lead.
The Spirit fight back.
“But it might go wrong”
“This is the One” - The Stone Roses, 1989
It will be a struggle for Racing to have many clean sheets this season. The team is not set up to defend for long stretches, especially against teams with the amount of attacking talent that the Spirit have. Having a new back line every match doesn’t help, but even when Racing figures out what a first choice back line looks like, I don’t believe that collectively the team can defend at the back for 90 minutes. Their style and philosophy are predicated on being tough to play against. This manifests itself most clearly when Racing presses high and disrupts things in the midfield. When their opponents have long stretches of uninterrupted possession, like the start of the second half where the Spirit had around 85% of the possession in Racing’s half, Racing tends to get penned in with no foreseeable way out. This happened a few times last season, and it looks like we may see a repeat this season. Regardless of the score, Racing needs to play every minute like the match is even or they are trailing because their best defense comes from aggression, not organization, unfortunately.
Racing found themselves with a 2-goal lead precisely because they capitalized on the things they do well. The first goal came from a decent spell of possession that resulted from the Spirit having to play a long ball to try to beat their press. The second was classic counter-attacking run from Sears. That is the winning formula for Racing against the league’s top teams. However, Racing has never been too keen on defending an early lead so the next evolution has to be that counter-possession thing that I always harp on. There were too many long clearances that came right back into Racing’s half, especially as the match wore on.
Fischer had a much better night as the central attacking threat in this match. Even if she was a bit fortunate on the goal, she was in better positions in this match. This was likely helped by Hase’s tendency to drift into central spaces and drag defenders with her. When both Hase and Sears can attract attention, it opens up the middle of the pitch for Fischer and Weber. Sears’ ability to play on both wings is a plus too. She looked more comfortable in her briefer spell on the left in this match. She had a decent shot on goal from a cut back onto her right foot, which is something that works better when she is on the left. Her similar movements on the right tend to set her up for passes or shots from tougher angles. On her breakaway goal she took every touch with her right foot. One of these days a defender might actually figure this out and start to overplay her if they can match her speed, which is much easier said than done.
Post Match Moment of the Match
After the post-match fireworks (Who are fireworks for? I didn’t see anyone who was particularly interested.), we got to speak to Bev, Jordyn and Lo. On the overall defending effort Bev said that they have to be ‘better in some of those moments” essentially to get the defensive shapes right and gain some control and respite. I pressed Bev a little about if there was anything “structurally or philosophically” that needed to be different, and she was pretty adamant that the answer was “no” and that they need to have “a bit more in us” in those moments when things are tough. There is a comforting element to her confidence and conviction, and it is still early in the season so one hopes that she is right and these little things get fixed and don’t become an epidemic.
I asked Jordyn what she was able to see on Cantore’s wonder goal. She said, “I thought I saw the ball perfectly and then as it was approaching my hands it went (makes a curving hand motion).” Fair enough. It really was one of the best goals I have ever seen live based on the swerve and the distance. Lo has been around for all of Racing’s persistent failures to close out games, so she really didn’t have anything to add other than “we have to find a way”. I guess that is why I pressed Bev on the structure and philosophy piece. It does seem to be this team’s Achilles heel.
Thing I bought at ear X-tacy back in the day
(I would have loved to have been a music journalist in the 90s in England, but unfortunately, I lived here. Therefore, I will do a little retrospective music journalism to amuse myself. I will even try to tie it to Racing or soccer in general. If you want to give it a go, contact me at admin@fleur-de-lis.fc and maybe I will use your piece. The rules are that you have to believe in good faith that you bought it at ear X-tacy, and it has to be “on-theme”. For example, don’t write about buying Nirvana’s “Nevermind” in 1993, but you can write about buying “Bleach” in 1989 or 1990. If that doesn’t make sense, maybe skip it.)
Artist: Paul Weller
Album: Stanley Road
Year: 1995
Format: CD (Import)
Store Location: 1534 Bardstown Road
The “punters” liked this album more than the critics if memory serves correctly. It was a UK #1 for Weller, who was firmly into the third phase of his career after a hugely successful first act leading The Jam and an ambitious and underrated (but ultimately unsuccessful) second act as the leader of The Style Council. This was his 3rd solo album and a follow up to the wildly successful (and frankly career rescuing) “Wild Wood” album. This album was the last one he released before being dubbed “The Modfather”, but he was already working his way into the “dad rock” category.
I was 20 when this album was released and Weller was just about to turn 37. He was “old” for a relevant pop artist, and there aren’t too many artists who consistently produce hits after turning 35, let alone 30. He seemed even older, probably because of his prodigious output and the reverence that people in Great Britain had and still have for him. What I wouldn’t give to be 37 now. This year Bev Yanez is in her 3rd season (3rd album?) as Racing’s head coach at the age of 37. If she is fortunate, this is the beginning of a long second act as a coach after act 1 as successful player.
The most famous song from the album today is likely Weller’s cover of Dr. John’s “I Walk on Gilded Splinters”. I say this because it is the music used in the closing music montage for The Wire’s Season 4. That episode, “Final Grades”, is usually thought of as The Wire’s best episode even if The Wire doesn’t really work that way. This year, I hope a line from that song might be appropriate for the “Sunshine Assassin”. I can see Bev smiling as she says, “see my enemy at the end of their rope”.
The Taylor Flint Honorary Yellow Card of the Match
Racing picked up two yellow cards in the match. The first one came in the 76th minute when a frustrated Sears shoved Kouassi (who always scares the heck out of me and was the best player on the pitch in the match) just a couple of minutes after the Spirit equalized. It was Fischer-esque but Kayla has been behaving herself well recently and I want to assume that she has somewhat “reformed” herself without losing her edge. The new namesake for this section didn’t let us down by picking up a silly one on a late challenge deep into stoppage time.
The Louisville (Draft?) Kings Sports Betting Corner
(Racing’s new co-tenant at Lynn Family Stadium surely only exists to quench the thirst of those who must “have action” on sports 365 days a year. I am not a gambler, but if you are I will suggest “easy money” from time to time. Your challenge will be to see if you can actually bet on it.)
I was going to go super easy on this first one and say take the -150 on a Taylor Flint yellow card suspension this season, but what might be more fun is an over/under on combined Taylor Flint/Emily Sonnett yellow cards this season. Let’s set the over/under at 16.5 which would mean that they will be better behaved this season. I am feeling the over on this one.
“All the plans that I have made”
One point from six isn’t the best of starts, but Racing has plenty of time to get things right. Nothing has been a disaster, but there also hasn’t been too much to make you believe that a mid-table finish isn’t the ceiling. That’s fine honestly. This team isn’t built to be an NWSL Shield winner. One does wish that their fate didn’t seem to be tied to some cosmic random number generator where all 3 outcomes seem equally likely and it is just like the roll of a 3-sided die. Some of that is the league itself, but with continued expansion maybe that will lessen for the good. Before the match, I did wonder to myself how Bev’s halftime adjustments will work this season if they have a lead at half. It is not fair to judge it based on one match, but despite all logic and probability, I think it is almost better for Racing to be all square at half and try to win matches late most of the time. It allows them to exploit their strengths and hide their weaknesses. I am all for Racing “boat racing” a team in the first half 4-0, but realistically I don’t see that happening all that often.
The difficult part is that Racing isn’t a defensive oriented team in the traditional sense. Most teams that are comfortable out of possession tend to be more defensively sturdy. They aren’t particularly good when they have long spells in either half. I know that sounds horrible, but it isn’t meant to be. Racing is at their best when they are making their opponent do things they don’t want to do. This season there has been too much comfortable possession conceded, and that will have to change if Racing is serious about a top half of the table finish.
