Dash 2 - Racing 1 Post Match Thoughts and Challenge Cup Wrap-up
Courtesy USA Today Sports Images
Now seems like as good of a time at any to perform a bit of a self-assessment, so I created a post that talks about how the site will work going forward. You can read it here, or skip that and move straight to rest of the post below. On the linked page I basically outline what I will and won’t be doing (because others do it better) on this site moving forward. It is basically a guide for what and when to expect from a coverage perspective this season.
Racing wrapped up the 2022 Challenge Cup with a 3rd place finish in the Central Division and a record of 1 win 3 draws and 2 losses. There were stretches were Racing played well and stretches where they struggled. I wouldn’t read a whole lot into this last preseason performance, but here is what stood out to me.
File this under “Painfully Obvious Observations”, but Racing is much better with Jessica McDonald on the pitch. We really haven’t seen much of McDonald and Salmon together which is a bit of a shame. Salmon’s performance last night mimicked a few of her rather forgettable performances last year where she seems to be completely isolated as the lone striker. She and Jess looked so good together in the first pre-season scrimmage of the year, it’s hard not to wonder if the flashes of brilliance we’ve seen from Davis and Ekic aren’t a bit down to having McDonald drag her defenders wide to open up a bit more space. Maybe we’ll be to see a Salmon/McDonald starting pairing at some point.
I talked about this a bit in my player ratings, but I wonder if teams are starting to get a feel for Julia Lester. I believe she is a fine player, but her calmness and confidence may have cost Racing a goal. One thing I know for sure is that I wouldn’t be dwelling on the ball too long with Nichelle Prince bearing down on me. Either way, Lester surely learned that she will have to pick her spots to be able to dribble out of trouble.
There were two mildly controversial decisions made in the match. Let’s start with the alleged “Goalie Interference” non-call. Goalkeepers are not made of glass and get way more protection from officials than I think they merit, so there is my bias stated up front. I still don’t think that was interference, but my beef is more with Racing’s outfield players on this one. I am going to give Gemma the benefit of the doubt on this one, as I assume it is her responsibility to get the defense organized for the set piece. Here is where you miss an Olofsson or a McDonald. Houston were basically allowed to crowd Bloomer with no real consequences. If I was a Racing player on the pitch that situation, one of those Dash players would firmly have my elbow in the small of their back before that kick is even taken. I would basically force one of the Dash players off the line, and basically force the official to come in and break up a scuffle. You see this in many other leagues. There is a bunch of flailing and nonsense before the kick is even taken. The freedom that the Dash players were given to crowd Bloomer was basically why you see these type of scuffles across soccer. You have to give the official a reason to act. If you are fine with letting your opponent crowd your goalie, what is the official supposed to do? Freja or Jess probably drags one of those players out of goal and causes the official to pay attention to the players encroaching on Bloomer’s space before the kick is taken. By the way, a completely reasonable person can disagree with this assessment and I wouldn’t take offense.
The second mildly controversial decision was Lo Milliet being flagged for offside and having her goal disallowed. There are a couple of components to this one. First, the image chose to freeze and share on the CBS Sports Network broadcast was flat out wrong. If you are going to perform a forensic analysis of an offside decision like VAR, you have to get the first element right which is the offside decision starts from the playing of the ball. In the image shared on the broadcast, the ball has CLEARLY not be played yet. In VAR terminology, the review freezes the decision as the kick point. Kizer’s leg is clearly in midair in the frozen frame that CBS chose to use. I stated above that reasonable people could disagree with my assessment of the keeper interference decision. Anyone disagreeing that you can’t use the frame that CBS chose to use is wrong. It is also a part of a bigger issue for me. If you immediately except the information being presented to you without the slightest bit of scrutiny, be prepared to have an incomplete and sometimes incorrect perspective on the situation. All of that being said, it is absolutely criminal that the sideline official ruled that goal offside. Zach Allen-Kelly looked at a different frame (but again, it’s a judgement call due to the poor quality of the broadcast) and Milliet is very slightly offside by the slightest margin. Regardless, there isn’t an official alive that could make that determination in real time. It was so close that it was purely guesswork. Traditionally, the attacking player is given the benefit of the doubt and is assumed to be onside unless proven offside. It was a terrible call on the field that was probably factually correct.
I have been looking forward to Parker Goins debut for a while and she didn’t disappoint. She was dangerous from the moment that she stepped on the pitch. More please, Mr. Björkegren.
This is not breaking news, but the CBS broadcast was terrible. I don’t know what more to say about it. The commentary swings wildly from painfully obvious to highly irrelevant to blatantly wrong so frequently that the broadcast should come with a motion sickness warning. I suggest watching on mute. The camera work is flat out terrible as well, but that may be a quality of the camera issue over an operator issue. The NWSL is really limiting its growth by not improving the quality of these broadcasts.
Tom Benson was kind enough to write a season preview for me, so I will probably leverage his kindness to write my preview piece for the State of Louisville website, so watch for that this week.
