Duh… not winning. Galaxy vs United post-game analysis

The Galaxy celebrates Mike Magee's 12th minute gol against DC United

Okay, let’s just get this out of the way at the top: Charlie Davies dove like a scuba professional searching for treasure in the Caribbean. He dove like the snout of a pig into the muck of the forest on the search for truffles. He dove like Greg Loughanis, like a lush into a seedy bar, like a bald eagle on a scampering mouse, like a hoarder on a shiny bottle cap, like a Wall Street banker on a bailout check, like, dare I say it, Carlos Ruiz. Nay, he dove like Kyle Martino in 2007 who wrangled not one, but two (!) PK’s from the ref in the course of a rare victory for the Galaxy that year. In, short, it was an award-winning performance the cost the Galaxy two road points and a chance to keep pace with the Colorado Rapids and Real Salt Lake in the West, both of whom have games in hand.

But, wait, did Charlie Davies and his dupe, referee Abbe Okulaja, really cost the Galaxy two points? After thinking about this overnight, I’m convinced of two things. One, its still a fool’s errand to blame the refs for outcomes like this. These mistakes tend to even themselves out over the course of a season, so today’s dropped points are tomorrow’s gained points. Two, Bruce Arena’s willingness to forgo a second goal with most of the second half remaining was what really cost the team.

Frankly, I’m a fan of Il Bruce. I think he makes good personnel choices that build the team and he understands what it takes to be successful in MLS within the raft of restrictions built into the league’s structure. But he’s also the kind of coach who is more willing to try to bunker on the road with a 1-0 win, then ice the game with a second gol. In fact, if you watch his road games, man, are the ugly, not just for the Galaxy, but the opposing side as well.

And that’s what was at play in the Galaxy-United game. Granted, the team was missing Landon Donovan, who picked up a bruised knee in practice, and Chris Birchall, who was serving a red-card suspension, but that seemed to hardly matter with a United team that was playing a make-shift line-up due to mid-week US Open Cup action and some key injuries (no Charlie Davies or Andy Najar to start, no Perry Kitchen at all). The Galaxy had the run of play and most of the possession in the first half, even after a rather disjointed and frantic first 10 minutes. The upside of the Arena road game philosophy is that it destroys the other team’s possession game as well. Then came Mike Magee’s elegant 12th minute header off a David Beckham corner and United wilted a bit while the Galaxy exerted their superior talent. A few timely and impressive saves from Donovan Ricketts and the team went into half-time with a deserved 1-0 lead, but with some niggling questions about better involvement of Juan Pablo Angel and striker-partner Miguel Lopez in the run of play.

But in the second half, when United coach Ben Olsen adjusted his side to add more offensive punch, first with Davies in the 53rd minute, then with Najar in the 73rd, Arena was content to have the team lay back, disrupting United build-up and attempting the occasional counter-attack until he flat-out quit trying just after Najar entered when he took off Becks for Jovan Kirovski. Now, had the team actually capitalized on some of its scoring chances in the second half, I wouldn’t be here dissecting this strategy. I’d be all up in praise of protecting the 2-0 road lead and the smart tactical choices of the coach. But Sean Franklin’s stoppage time shot on a empty went went over the bar just as a first half scramble in front of the United gol mouth ended with an Ethan White clearance off the line. Make either one of those opportunities count and Davies’ Oscar audition doesn’t matter.

I’ll tell you what worries me the most about the team at this point in the season and it isn’t the abysmal MLS reffing so far this season (not just for the Galaxy – lots of these games seem to be being reffed by guys who think they are still in pre-season) nor is it Arena’s tactical choices. It’s the fact that even with JPA, Beckham, and Donovan on the field, the strikers account for one of the Galaxy’s five gols, combined with the fact that in five games the Galaxy have only five gols and a -1 gol differential. Looking at that makes me think that the real motivation behind Il Bruce’s tactical choices is his complete lack of confidence in the team being able to score. And that’s not an idle worry. Not only is the team scoring with all the verve of a bunch of anemic geriatrics, but that scoring is almost all coming from the midfield. For all the new strikers the team brought in to replace Edson Buddle, nobody has decided to step up and take on the scoring burden. Going into games in Toronto (Wednesday) and Chicago (Sunday), that’s the biggest problem Arena needs to solve, conservative tactics or no.

Man of the Match: Donovan Ricketts

What about you? What did you see? Who stepped up? Who didn’t? What about that Davies dive? And what about those tactics? Leave your thoughts in the comments below.

Game highlights

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Category: post-game analysis