Dash v Racing Preview
The big news from practice today was that Wang Shuang joined practice and is evidently available for immediate selection.
Coach Björkegren was absent from practice due to feeling unwell, but is expected to travel with the team to Houston. That meant that Coach Mario Sanchez led practice and was available to the media afterwards. I hesitate to lump the rest of Racing's fans in with me, so let me just say that I am at the point of the season where I am most looking forward to seeing what the team can do to make sure next year's squad is ready to hit the ground running AND seeing how much Racing is willing to “go for it” next week in The Women's Cup. With that in mind, I asked Coach Sanchez about next week. “We treat it like every other game,” was his response, which was good to hear. Last year, Racing was still practically in the playoff hunt during The Women's Cup, so there was a need to balance how to approach the final. For all of the bad things about the previous coach's tenure, I will say that he got that balance exactly right in that Racing won a trophy AND were rested for their next NWSL match. Of course they laid an absolute egg in that next match in Kansas City, but the roster management was right. This go around however, there isn't anything really to play for in the league beyond getting the core players for next season more time together on the pitch. Ultimately I don't think Racing will throw out a starting lineup like this next week,
but given the squads current construction, there really isn't room to go too wild. Or is there? It's not beyond the realm of possibility or even probability that some of Racing's academy players get a look in. Ella Sanchez was on the bench for the Women's Cup final, so maybe she gets a few minutes this time around. The point is: I want that trophy no matter how trivial it is.
Before that, we have Houston to “worry” about. The rest of the league season should be about evaluating the sqaud and the system. AND spoiling other teams playoff hopes. I would love to see Racing beat Houston and knock them into a tailspin of epic proportions that is somehow so bad that it gets them relegated in a league where that isn't even actually possible. Barring that, I'll take another solid performance.
Another thing to keep an eye on (if you are into such things) is if Racing sticks with its formation change. I frankly think people get too hung up on formations, and I can tell you that a player's situational positioning is much more important than their nominal starting point in a formation. Do look for Racing to continue to defend with numbers when they don't have possession (call it 5 at the back if you wish), because I think that worked well in the previous match.
One last thing: I finally got to give Nadia a small token of appreciation for being the first Racing player to score multiple goals in a match. Unfortunately, in the picture I got Nadia had her eyes closed, so instead of that, here is a picture of the actual “token”:
She graciously accepted it and then immediately and hilariously used it as a Frisbee, which delighted me greatly.
