THE GOOD, THE BAD, THE UGLY...AND OTHER MUSINGS

Robert Rovick
April 30, 2007

It's somewhat fitting the Crew get their first win of the season in the game against DC United Saturday night. Over the past 3 league matches, the Crew had controlled much of the possession and were perhaps unlucky not to come away with wins instead of ties. In this match, a draw might have been a fair result given how much possession the Crew ceded to DC Saturday night. Then again, given the Crew's many counter attacking opportunities in the second half, a 3-nil result for the Black and Yellow wouldn't have been out of the question either. This game just highlights the fact that sometimes playing a possession game can be overrated. If a team does nothing with its control over the match, all that possession amounts to nothing.

The Good

The Great Gonzo: Just write his name at the top in ink every week right here so it'll save me the key strokes. Nothing gets by this central defender.

Grab a Beer: Ned Grabavoy deserves to be highlighted tonight over every other attacker. Grabavoy is simply a special player and if the Crew do go anywhere this year, it'll be because Grabavoy brought the Crew there. His touches were limited on the night, as he was asked to do a lot more defending then normal due to DC's pressure, even so, he still found a way to affect the game with his 28 minute pass to Joseph Ngwenya that helped set up the goal. The vision he displays on the pitch, the touch he puts on his passes, and his close ball control that allows him to slip defenders make him the most creative player the Crew have seen since Jeff Cunningham left town. It's just scary to think of how much better his play will get when he has a professional the caliber of Guillermo Schelotto out there with him.

EZ Rider: Ezra Hendrickson is easily one of the top players on this team that I criticized from last year. I really thought it would be best for both parties if he just retired. This year, however, EZ has been a consistent performer suiting up next to Gonzalez. He's taking up good positions, making the right decisions, and his distribution out of the back is superb. Even if he didn't score the winning goal last night, he is more then worthy of praise for his performance last night. Game to game, play to play consistency has been his problem with the Crew. If he can keep these kinds of performances up, it'll be very difficult to remove him from the lineup once Chad Marshall regains fitness.

Professionalism: One of my huge fears going into the match against DC was knowing how good a possession team they are. No team can hide a weak defense as well as DC United by being able to move the ball around quickly, keep possession in the midfield, and then turn that possession into goals. I didn't care they were winless and pointless in their two opening games coming in. With Ben Olsen, Christian Gomez, Jamie Moreno around, that team was going to see a lot of the ball. How would the Crew respond to being in the opposite role they had mostly put their opponents in the previous three games? I thought they really answered that question Saturday. If the other team cedes possession, the Crew can play a possession game and create chances for themselves on the offensive end. This was even evidenced in the game Saturday as the Crew had the better of possession in the first 35 minutes. If the other team, such as DC in the last 10 minutes and 2nd half, gains a lot of possession, they can sit back, defend, and still create chances for themselves off the counter. The entire team stayed compact defensively and didn't cede anything to the dangerous DC attackers up the middle. Being able to adapt and respond to the play on the field as it unfolds is exactly the type of professionalism this team has lack for many years. In the end, that professionalism might be the biggest contribution head coach Sigi Schimd has brought to this club.

Finally: After last week's wreak of a performance by referee Ricardo Salazar, watching Jorge Gonzalez arbitrate the match was a breath of fresh air. After watching the game on the tape, I have to say it was one of the most consistent performances from a referee I've ever seen in this league. He caught everything big like the hand ball by Emilio and the Gomez dive, he protected the players with timely yellow cards, and generally kept the flow of the game going in a game that perhaps the two teams involved were intent to make a little chippy. I thought the players really responded to the consistency as well, as there was very little complaint from them after calls. Jorge can come and ref any Crew game in the future he wants...well until he completely screws up a call against the Crew, then he goes back to being a wanker.

Buzz: For the first time since really the opening game of the 2003 season, there is a buzz going around Columbus Crew Stadium. You can feel it as a fan flowing through the stands with the supporters' groups in 103 and 137 and the general stands. You can see it on the field with the players as they feed off that energy. And the display at the end of the game where the players came out to thank the fans will just further fuel the fire that's been building at the stadium. One has to wonder, when this buzz will trickle out to the masses in Columbus to let them know that soccer is once again being played at Hunt Park and the Crew can get the attendance of past years.

The Bad

Go, Dog, Go: The play of the wingers, Ngwenya and Ricardo Virtuoso, and the center forward Kei Kamara was not bad. At best it was average; several good moments, several bad moments. This bad isn't so much about their overall play per say, but something I've seen from these players over the past 4 games that really gets at me. It irks me to no end when I see a wing player or forward get a 1v1 against a defender facing goal and he just kind of holds the ball until inevitably a second defender comes into the area. Then he goes at them and more times then not beats one defender and loses to the second. If they are going to take that defender on, they need to do it at pace, when they have the advantage. Receive the ball, decide if you want to go or not, if not find a central option or switch the point of attack. Don't just stand there waiting for the next defender to come into the picture.

Still ain't Getting It: The finishing, just as bad as last week and the weeks before. Hopefully Schelotto can remedy some of this.

The Ugly

The Weather Man: I can't think of anything really ugly about the Crew's first win of the season against DC United. It's a win...at home...against DC United. That's a beautiful thing. I could complain about the weather though. According to the weather channel, there was a 10% chance of rain. It rained. How the meteorologists didn't figure this one out I don't know. The Crew were playing at home. Of course it was going to rain. Idiots.

Musings

Next week against KC will be the first match Schelotto is available to play in Black and Yellow. The question is, will he? He's been back and forth between here and Argentina over the last week since officially signing last Tuesday. Next week will be his first full week of training where he'll begin the tall task of getting acclimated with the team and players. On top of training, Guillermo will also have the task of get things situated for he and his family. It's possible Sigi could leave him out in order to acclimate Schelotto to the team and city, then allow him to make his debut against Chivas USA at home the next week. On the other hand, Schelotto is a seasoned professional and Sigi didn't pick him up to sit on the bench. In the end, it really could all come down to how quickly the other players respond to Schelotto in practice and how soon they can pick out his tendencies, as to how much time, if any, Guillermo gets against KC.

The other issue surrounding Schelotto is once he's ready to start, where to start him? I've touched on it a little before, but now that he's officially here, a spot will have to open up eventually for him to start. The way the Crew play their 4-3-3, which is more a 4-2-3-1, the a-mid position is really more a hybrid a-mid/withdrawn striker roll. The position comes with a lot of freedom to move around and pick out runs. Schelotto's skill set certainly makes this a prime spot for him to fill and it's a position the Crew lack a certain amount of quality at the moment. Eddie Gaven currently occupies this important role and has been at best average. He's been good, to out right outstanding, around the midfield, but his game falls apart in the final third. This position might just be the most important on the field as the more pressure the player in this position puts on the defense, the more room the central forward will get. Getting in position to score goals and not putting them away simply isn't acceptable here. One can't help wondering if Schelotto had been in some of the positions Eddie worked himself into, yet couldn't finish, would the end result be a little different for Guille and the Crew?

Another consideration in the decision where to place Schelotto is the play of Grabavoy and Stefani Miglioranzi. Grabavoy routinely shows the vision, passing, and ability to put the ball on frame needed to play in that a-mid/withdrawn forward position. His contribution as a deep laying attacking midfielder in the second holding midfield spot have been simply amazing for the Crew and it could be that he is too valuable there to be moved farther forward. However, whenever he has been moved forward late in games he has excelled in this roll and Miglioranzi might just be the key to allow Sigi to make this move. Miglioranzi was a jack of all trades last week, playing in central defense during the Open Cup game and in central midfield as substitute against DC. In the game against DC, Stefani excelled in his central midfield spot, twice getting in the box for shots (both he should have nailed, but didn't). Miglioranzi also did an amazing job in the preseason dismantling of FC Dallas in the Lamar Hunt Pioneer Cup playing in the midfield, assisting on all three goals. If Stefani can play that way consistently and stay healthy, the Crew could afford to move Grabavoy farther forward. With that, the Crew could then place Schelotto in his preferred wing forward spot.