Sunday, September 11, 2011

Hey Crew, What's Happening

Slow start from Dilly Duka. He looked like he did at the start of the season, which is frustrating. The Generation Adidas player looked slightly better at moments later in the game but still not up to where many think he should be. I'm not pinning the loss on him (or the loss in Seattle two weeks ago) but at some point this player needs to find his place or he will never graduate*.

As for the rest of the team? Something hasn't been quite right for the Crew during there last two games. The 6-2 beat down in Seattle and now the 4-2 loss to a weaker team in Toronto. Or 10-4 aggregate. Or -6. Or +crummy. Two horrible losses book ending a bye week.

It's only two games so it is not time to panic. A 34 game season is plenty long to allow for 4 points of data in any direction. Even though it is late in the season, it will take 2 more games like the last two for me to start getting upset.

Hard to see any silver lining in this loss to TFC, but they are a team in the middle of their best run of the year. Should they be beating the Crew at home though? No. Nobody should be.

Notable Play:

Hesmer had a gruesome day. On the blooping header he showed his heavy feet. Same speed/quickness issue late in the game on his decision to come way off his line. He was 3 steps late on that one.

Ekpo and Duka weren't effective in their rolls. I noticed Ekpo dropping back quite a bit, perhaps to aid a recovering Balchan.

Burns should be filing a police report this morning. Foul or not, he needs to be stronger on the ball and have better positional awareness when he has the ball. His lack of both led to the assault the produced a goal. Great play from de Guzman. Burns went down too easily.

Renteria and Mendoza. Jury is still out on this combo but common cogs in both blowout games.

Mr. Rogers played well. His crosses were to good places, just nobody there in the 1st half. Renteria is not a target man (nor is Mendoza, either).

Heinemann had his best game of the year. He was the man Rogers needed and it paid off. He also dropped a beautiful pass to Mendoza that produced a goal.

Final Thoughts:

Columbus has opened it up in attempt to score more goals over the past few weeks. As a result, they are allowing too many. Games involving the Crew should not be 4,3,8,6 goal affairs (last 4 games).

Event Horizon Player of the Game:

Dwight Burgess. He called a great game. His best game.


* More on Generation Adidas players. It seems very loose.

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