Reign v Racing Preview
Courtesy Racing Louisville via Twitter
Racing travel to Seattle today to prepare for their 2nd league match of the season on Suday at 6PM EDT. The OL Reign are their opponents and they frankly have quite a bit to be angry about. First, the OL Reign should have been afforded the opportunity to play at home as the overall #1 seed in the recent Challenge Cup semifinals. However, their home pitch Lumen Field was hosting the CONCACAF Champions League final, where the Seattle Sounders became the first MLS club to win that particular trophy. Scheduling is always a challenge for the NWSL, but was there any real need to be so hard and fast with the schedule for the Challenge Cup? Once the 4 semifinalists were determined, I think there could have been some flexibility to move the Spirit/Reign match to a Tuesday or a Thursday. TV will always be the determining factor in these decisions and the NWSL was stupidly locked into a 1PM EDT kickoff for the final this Saturday. Is the kick-off time for a national television spot (what even is that anymore?) more important than anything else? To the NWSL it apparently is. One of these days we will get over the fascination of having sports on “broadcast” television. I really hope the NWSL finds a better partner than CBS next time the TV contract is up for negotiation. Second, the officials missed an obvious handball in the final minutes that almost assuredly would have been a converted penalty by Megan Rapinoe (she entered the match by this point just to be on the pitch to take a penalty in the shootout, which she converted.) Third and perhaps most important, the above two factors probably greatly reduced their probability to advance and ultimately compete for the $10,000/player reward for winning the Challenge Cup. That would be plenty of motivation for me.
However, the Reign are coming off of a midweek match and potentially could have some tired legs at the end of the upcoming match. I tend not to put too much stock into this, but it could be a factor if the game is close late. More important on the Racing side is the need to cut down on lapses in concentration/judgement. I have written several times about the statistics in soccer not mattering as much as other sports. In fact, sometimes it doesn’t even matter if you are the best team on the pitch. If you watched the UEFA Men’s Champions League semifinal on Wednesday between Man City and Real Madrid, this was on clear display. One of my favorite all-time footballers is Thierry Henry (duh). The Arsenal legend talked about the “moments” being so critical in that match. His point was that a lapse in concentration or effort in defense, or an extraordinary effort in attack often renders the rest of the match meaningless. Racing has shown both the tendency to embrace these moments in attack, but be incredibly susceptible to them at times on defense. Matches requires 90 plus minutes of concentration, something that this Racing team has yet to demonstrate. The team has shown resiliency, but not necessarily the ability to play all 90 minutes fully committed to the cause of winning.
In lighter news, Racing has the opportunity to attend Thurby at Churchill Downs which looked like fun. Of course, they won’t get to experience Oaks or Derby since they will be in Seattle. With an OL Reign victory on Wednesday, they may have at least been able to experience Louisville during these two days, but at least they knew they would be flying to Seatle on Friday by 11 or so on Wednesday night. Have I mentioned that I hate this league? I debated writing an article about the NWSL’s use of “Chaos” as a brand, but thought better of it. My main point would have been that their embrace of “Chaos” on the field translates to “Chaos” in the front office. Since I just came out and said that in a single sentence there is no need to write that article. The reason I decided against finishing the article (I got about halfway through it) was that I know that some people find the chaos exciting. I guess that’s fair, but March Madness is exciting and sometimes chaotic on the court…with a ton of logistical planning and support behind it. My patience has run out for this league. They need to get it together. One final note on “Chaos”: San Diego still don’t have actual kits while KC dropped another one this morning.
As for the match itself, Racing actually gets to play a team that is not Chicago, Kansas City, or Houston! Racing lost away and drew at home vs. the OL Reign last year, but that probably doesn’t mean much (so why did I even type that sentence?) Who knows what Rapinoe’s status is? Quinn is probably still out. Lavelle, Balcer, Huerta, Cook, Hiatt and Fishlock played 90 minutes, so there could be some rotation. Racing will probably roll out a lineup similar to last week vs. Chicago. Again there was no media availability this week, so I am free to speculate on the lineup. I’ll go Lund, Fox, Lester, Bonner, Merrick, Howell, DeMelo, Ekic, Kizer, Salmon, McDonald. Now that I put that out there, you can almost certainly bet against that lineup. I think Salmon needs starting minutes soon, or I am just going to assume that she isn’t part of the long-term plans as there are several other options at forward. I think DeMelo and Ekic have forced their way into the lineup, but I’m not the manager so it doesn’t matter what I think. If Racing can keep it close early, I think the most interesting part of this match will be to see which team dictates play. Racing have shown the ability to do so, and if they can do so in this match it will be encouraging regardless of the outcome.
