Of Midfield Mediocrity and (lack of) Killer Mentality: LAG vs. FCD Post-Game Analysis

By: NathanHJ | May 25th, 2009

I gave myself the better part of two days before committing this Galaxy-FCD postmortem to the foreverness of the internets because I wanted to get past the bitter taste of frustration lingering in my mouth after Saturday’s excursion to Frisco. I wanted to see if that would change what I had to say.

And because I am an older, wiser person than I was just two days ago, it has. I’m going to be kinder and gentler than I might otherwise have been, but it turns out that I can’t shake that metallic tang of frustration the Galaxy seem to be specializing in.

We are now officially one third of the way through the season and one game away from losing the best player currently with the the team for the next four or so. Good time to take some stock of the situation. Dave’s reply to the game preview (and in-game comments, which are desperately in need of someone other than myself making the bulk of) in which he looked at the team as he does when he’s playing FIFA Futbol Manager, is a great place to start. He breaks it down front-to-back. But I’m gonna break it down back-to-front.

Keeper: Donovan Ricketts is a major upgrade from the past year. He’s a keeper, as it were. The Galaxy, which fixed something that wasn’t broken when they sent Kevin Hartman to KC and brought in Joe Cannon from Colorado, is back to having a top tier stopper in net. Backup Josh Saunders scares me with his inexperience and memories of that horrible Colorado game.

Game vs. FC Dallas: Solid, with three tie-salvaging saves. Continues to often be the best Galaxy player on the field.

Backline: So much better than Franklin and the Three Sieves we had last year. So much better. Berhalter and Gonzalez are making a great team and Franklin and Dunivant at the wingbacks have loads of offensive potential. Except for injuries and recuperation. Which is why I’m a bit worried about Franklin being out indefinitely with a hammy muscle tear and Dunivant sitting out games “for rest”. Like the roster at the rest of the positions, the backups for the defense are thin. Delagarza and Sanneh as the top two go-to guys.

Game vs FC Dallas: Gonzalez missed his assignment on Drew Moor and left his keeper out to dry. Not cool. But the rest of the game he helped contain a very active Kenny Cooper and cleaned up to occasional mess caused by Brek Shea’s shenanigans on the left. Delagarza did well enough is a difficult situation playing on the right for the first time, though he did have a shakey first 20 minutes dealing with Shea. Overall, same solid performance that has the Galaxy 5th best in the league in goals allowed.

Midfield: Last year the biggest weakness, outside of goal, was the Galaxy’s backline. This year it is the holding and defensive midfielders. Actually last year, this weakness contributed to how badly the backline did since there was nothing in the center of the park to protect the defense and help control the game. This year, Kovalenko has been a serious upgrade over Vagenas and Franchino, Lewis is solid on the left, and Klein and that British guy will have the right locked down. But the spot claimed by Miglioranzi and occasionally by Tudela needs an upgrade.

In fact, the whole midfield scheme needs an overhaul despite solid players to slot into various spaces. The real problem is that the midfield lacks two necessary qualities to capitalize on the much stouter defense and take advantage of Landon Donovan and a healthy Edson Buddle: one, someone who is an outlet for the defense to link with or for the other midfielder to dump-off to, and two, someone who can turn around and make that linking pass to the flank run, or make the smart distribution up the field to start an attacking sequence.

If you want to see what a real midfield looks like in MLS, then watch Rico Clark, Brad Davis, Brian Mullan, and Stuart Holden play together sometime. There’s a reason Houston won back-to-back championships in 2007 and 2008 and those guys are a big part of it (switch Holden for Mulrooney and add DeRo to be real about it). Watching them dismantle San Jose, a team with a pretty good defense, was a thing of beauty. Rico Clark is a great ball winner in the Clyde Simms/Brian Carroll tradition and can then turn around and spark a dangerous attack like a Shalrie Joseph or Osvaldo Alanso can. Stuart Holden is coming into his own as an attacking midfielder with responsibility for finding the forwards. And the flank play of Mullan and Davis is probably without an equal at this point in the MLS season (though you gotta think that Chicago, once they settle on a line-up, will give them a run for the money).

But the Galaxy don’t have that kind of combination or those kinds of players. The midfield is, despite the presence of Eddie Lewis, Chris Klein, and Kovalenko, still mostly mediocre. The parts aren’t fitting well together.

Game vs. FC Dallas: Mediocre. If you can’t control the game with the other team goes down by a starting midfielder halfway through the first half, then there isn’t anything else to say, really. D-mid is better than last year. Link with the offense still missing. Working as a unit is missing. And some key personnel who can help life the game of the team overall are missing. Without serious attention here, then the team won’t be good enough to make the playoffs.

Forwards: Decent with the potential for danger. But only if Buddle and Donovan can be on the field at the same time for the full game. Buddle’s continuing injury problems have surely cost the team a couple of ties that could have been wins but for a sputtering attack. And Donovan depends on smart wing play to free him up to have the space to create. He does very well coming out of deep-lying positions in the midfield, running at players and dishing off or making dangerous slashing runs into the corners. Playing off of Buddle is ideal especially when Lewis and Klein can deliver good service to his feet.

But the back-ups are problematic. Magee runs hot and cold. He’s been hot enough to start the last two games and play fairly well, though he disappeared against FC Dallas for long stretches. Jordan is still just good for 20 -30 minutes of non-stop running and energy. Kirovski brings veteran vision to the game, but I’m just not that impressed with the rest of his game. I honestly don’t understand how he started so many games in Colorado. Gordon has terrible feet, is prone to reckless tackles, and comes back too deep into the midfield to get balls, but is tall and strong and scores just when you are ready to write him off for the rest of the season. Tristan Bowen is untried and Israel Sesay is still about 12 and plays like it. There’s not a lot of bang behind to the Donovan and Buddle and with Donovan leaving for almost all of June, it’s going to be desperate times up top.

Game vs. FC Dallas: Not horrible. Donovan scores off of a nice series of passes. Then the midfield fails to take over the game and continues to provide sporadically adequate service to the attack. Gordon needed to do better and Donovan needed to play a bit smarter.

So I think I’m laying the blame for this Dallas thing at the feet of the midfield. But I do want to say something about the mentality of the players. They’ve had a huge number of minutes to play as the team with the man advantage and in every situation except the Columbus one, they’ve failed to take advantage. It’s almost criminal how they’ve been unable to score goals with a man advantage. To me its almost like the team decides at that point that they don’t have to work hard to win. That the game will just work itself out. And then we get ties. It just can’t be acceptable to play so many games with a numbers advantage and not strike the killer blow to the other team. It’s like the team needs to be behind before they ratchet up the play to the next level. Giving the team an advantage (scoring first, a man up) and they take their foot off the gas and let the other team take the game to them. Part of it is personnel, I grant you, but part of it is mental. Winning teams win those kinds of games, even if they don’t quite have the right talent. The Galaxy should be winning these kinds of games. But they aren’t. And they aren’t because they are missing something mentally.

Luckily the Western Conference is still packed with teams within 5 points of each other and there are still 20 games to go, so playoff spots are still very much up for grabs. But with a mediocre midfield and the core of the offense leaving for a month, its is suddenly crunch time. But the crunch time mentality is out to lunch. Someone is going to have to step up so that when Becks and Donovan get back, there’s still something to play for.

What others are saying:

MLSNet Game Summary by Steve Hunt
MLSNet Galaxy Perspective from Steve Hunt
MLSNet FC Dallas Perspective from Steve Hunt
Fort Worth Star Telegram
AP Via the LA Times
Goal.com
Dallas Morning News Game Recap by Kate Hariopaulous
Dallas Morning News odds and ends by Kate Hariopaulous

What about you guys? What did you see? Am I missing key pieces of the analysis? Did someone have a stellar game that I missed or have a crappy game that I praised? After the first third of the season what needs to change? What’s good and needs to be left alone? Leave your thoughts in the comments below.