What Do You Think? Do We Still Have a Chance?
By: Laurie | September 27th, 2009
In some quarters, the grieving process has begun. I’m hearing murmurings of Well, it was good while it lasted…
What do you think?
There’s no question that Seattle seriously damaged its playoff hopes yesterday. If DC United continues to have its way with San Jose as they did in the first half of the match, (and if my math is correct), we will be in eighth place tonight — just BARELY holding onto a playoff spot.
It could have been a lot worse this weekend — we were helped out by teams like Columbus and Dallas and New York, and there’s still a huge glut of teams in the 35-39 point range. But I don’t think that any Seattle fans can say right now that they feel as hopeful now about they post-season as they did even a month ago.
So what do you think? Can our boys still do it? Will we be squeaking into the playoffs, or, come November, will we be licking our wounds and searching all corners of the world for a guy who can bring that missing je ne sais quoi to our attack in 2010?
And if you were Sigi, what would you be doing right now to make the post-season happen?
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I think we’ll be at home, looking for the two guys that we need to complete the team. The first is a true CAM so we can make full use of Ljungberg where he’s best, out of the wing. The second is a true target forward who can hold the ball, win headers, and actually play to his height. Our central defenders win pretty much any header that comes near them. If we had a forward who could do the same thing that would allow us to control games from end to end.
As for Sigi, some of his moves yesterday were beyond mystifying. Okay, so you want to make a change and you’re going to bring Roger on. Why take off Zakuani? He was one of the few players presenting any sort of attacking threat. Why not take Jaqua off and see if Roger can improve the link up play in the midfield. He certainly couldn’t do a worse job handling the ball than Jaqua. I sometimes feel that Sigi has roles in his formation for certain kinds of players, and the players who are closest to the type he’s looking for get slotted in regardless of whether they’re actually any good at the role or not. At this point, it’s way too late to come up with some tactical innovation, so we’re going to have to hope we get lucky.
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“I sometimes feel that Sigi has roles in his formation for certain kinds of players, and the players who are closest to the type he’s looking for get slotted in regardless of whether they’re actually any good at the role or not.”
Exactly. This puts words to an inchoate thought that’s been floating around my brain for the last few months. Jaqua = Target Man, Good With His Head. Until reality sets in and he really doesn’t. But that’s still the role he’s expected to fill.
Sigi’s a great coach IF he actually has the players to fill the roles. Last year at Columbus he did. This year he’s got a few holes, and he’s doing exactly what you describe.
(I’m still holding out hope for the post-season, though.)
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Also: San Jose came back and beat DC 2-1! Nice help from the underdoggies.
(Also, we’re watching the Seahawks, but my son said he flipped back and saw Wicks leaving the field with his arm in a sling. Sucks to be you, Josh.)
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We need a true CAM that is an absolute ace with set pieces, and a target forward that can actually play. We’re so easy to play against: just foul us all the time and don’t allow any type of rhythm to the game, we’ve got no answer to that. We need a player who can drive the ball into the goal from direct kicks, and hopefully with the new CBA we get another DP spot to use w/o salary cap implications, and then we sign someone for the big bucks. Then the other teams in MLS stop fouling us all the damn time.
If I were Sigi right now, I’d completely bench Jaqua, put in Sanna Nyassi for his speed, and start fouling the crap out of the opposing teams Don Revie Leeds style. Oh, and focus the entire rest of the season on goalscoring within the box.
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If we beat Dallas and either win 1 of the other 2 OR draw both of the other 2, I think we still get in.
I’m torn on Jaqua… I like the guy, but I’m torn between a) he’s slow and somewhat clumsy and we need to bench him and b) but he gets a lot of assists, no?
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Also, I am SHOCKED at how little talk there has been about the fact that Joseph was offside for that last goal. There was a linesman right there watching, and no flag, despite the absolutely inarguable fact that the attacker was offside.
Yeah, we sucked and deserved to lose, but not on an illegal goal.
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It was close DaveS but you’re right he was nearer to the endline than the second to last defender. It’s one of those things that you have to judge in a split second Right when the ball is kicked. Easy to see on a replay, hard to tell when live and at field level.
To be honest the missed offside doesn’t bother me as much as the horrible marking.
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I’ll have to go back and watch it, but I don’t think he was onside at all during that period when the play was developing and the kick might have occurred.
In any case, you’re right about the marking.
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Everything that follows is a quote of “lawdawg82″ from the Seattle Times blog comments… seems about right:
Guys – We are almost a lock for at least the 8th playoff spot. Not where I’d like us to be but I’ll take it because on any given day, we can beat any time in this league so you never know…I think this is also how Sigi and the team sees it.
The only 3 teams that can push us out of the playoffs are United, RSL and TFC. We’re all level on games played and we’ve won season series against all 3 teams, thats the first tie break.
UNITED
-We lead by 2 pts.
-Chivas, Crew, KC remaining. (H, H, A)TFC
-We lead by 3 pts.
-SJ, RSL, NYRB remaining. (H, H, A)RSL
-We lead by 4 pts.
-NYRB, TFC, COL remaining. (H, A, H)All things considered, I’m confident we can do it…even if we get 4 pts in 3 games, United need 7, TFC need 8 (meaning they need to win out as you can’t get 8pts in 3 games), RSL need 9.
So basically, if any of these 3 teams lose any remaining games, we’re 90% locked in.
Go Sounders, bring back your USOC run form!
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