Thorns FC: Point/Counterpoint

Last Friday the Thorns and visiting Angel City FC thrashed their way to a rainy 1-1 draw.

It wasn’t always pretty, and ACFC isn’t really very good, so there’s a point to noting that we’re still in the Ken Era and so likely still far from the broad, sunlit uplands of a top four finish in 2025.

The counterpoint is that we saw some individual performances that were hearteningly good, both from our usual veterans and, in particular, from some of the youngsters from whom we’ve been hoping to see good work but who haven’t been getting minutes.

Well, last week some of them did, and damn but we saw some really good things.

Including several promising attacks built on those performances. Yes, there was a lot of Random KenRunning. But there were also some pretty sequences which we’ll discuss in a bit.

But.

Let’s get this out of the way first; we also saw some familiar, not-so-good things. Defensive errors both individual and collective. Things like this:

Ninth minute and ACFC had been pushing forward from the kickoff. Giselle Thompson worked the ball down the right flank. Reyna Reyes gave her enough space for Thompson to dink a little drop-cross into Kennedy Fuller…

When she received the ball it looked like Fuller was draped with Sam Coffey, but…

…Coffey didn’t react quickly enough when Fuller spun away and cranked up a hard low shot.

The shot didn’t look that dangerous, frankly, but Mackenzie Arnold dove late, and slow – I’m still not sure if Arnold was screened by Isabella Obaze or not; she certainly gave Obaze a round bollocking afterwards which suggests that she thought so, anyway- and the Angels were up a goal inside ten minutes.

But that was almost the end of AC’s Happy Time. They had one more good try, a Thompson blast four minutes later that Arnold did very well to save, and then the field tilted hard the other way.

16′ – Long spell of Portland possession in front of AC’s goal leading to a Deyna Castellanos shot blocked out for the first Portland corner kick.
17′ – Good pressure off the corner but Obaze fired way over to end the sequence.
19′ – AC turnover deep gave Castellanos another crack, but she, too, fired wide.
20′ – Terrific pressure from Reilyn Turner forced AC keeper Angelina Anderson into a turnover that Olivia Moultrie snapped up and fired hard at the Angel defender…

…who deflected the shot wide of the AC post for…

…a fucking goal kick? Seriously?

You can see how Moultrie felt about that. This wasn’t the worst mistake that center referee Greg Dopka made – we’ll talk about that in the comments – but you can see how good a look he had and how he still fluffed this call. Sheesh. Take another bong hit, nimrod.

25′ – Nice buildup between Hina Sugita and Moultrie to Payton Linnehan, but Linnehan’s drop-pass was just a touch past Castellanos to end the sequence.
29 – Moultrie again, with a deft headed through-ball for Turner to run onto and force Anderson to dive to turn the ball around her right post.
30 – Moultrie with the looping corner that went through the pack; all the Angels were ballwatching as it skipped off a pink foot to Turner who easily poked home the equalizer. All square at 1-1.

There was a lot more of this. Portland pretty much ran the table but couldn’t convert, AC’s anemic attack produced only sporadic danger, but when they did, as here, in the 89th minute…

…they were unlucky; you can see how Fuller is utterly unmarked and Arnold is stranded, defending her near post from a possible Thompson shot. If Thompson’s cross had been a skosh to the left or Fuller a step closer to goal this was a tap-in killer.

C’mon, defenders (and midfielders – when a midfield led by Grandma Time Alanna Kennedy is bossing you? You got work to do)! Play until you drop, or the final whistle!

So, point – Portland pretty much bossed a poorer AC squad for about 75-80 minutes but couldn’t put them to the sword despite some fine individual work. The understanding, team cohesion, collective nous? It’s not there…yet.

Plus, finishing..?

Fuckadoodledoo! Almost half a goal on the table. Or worse; here’s Henderson handing Portland over 2xG:

His post-shot xG looks even harsher to Portland; 2.28. That’s some wasted opportunities, gang. You had these people on the ropes; you gotta finish them.

Good teams aren’t fun, they’re not merciful, they’re mean and vicious and ruthless. More of that, please.

Counterpoint? This looked significantly less-scrambled, less-overrun, less, well, bad than Kansas City. What’s hard to say is how much of that was “Portland got better” and how much was “ACFC sucks harder than KCC”.

This coming weekend we’re going to see The Damned Courage, currently one spot above us on the table (10th to our 11th), both clubs 0-1-1, but their 2GF, 3GA gives them the edge in GD to our 2GF 4GA.

I think we’re going to see some real hints of how the rest of KenBall’s 2025 might go from that match; stay tuned.

Short Passes

As we saw in Kansas City, both sides were kinda meh; again, Portland was a bit better at 75% completion, but of only 360 passes while the Angels completed 73% of 416, unsurprising given the overall edge in possession, 54% ACFC to 44% Portland.

Here’s our “vaudevillian cane” blogger andre carlisle with his lovely passing charts. First Portland:

Still narrow AF up front, and the usual issues with lots of back-and-forth around the back. But…better! The narrow green rings around the Turner/Linnehan/Castellanos circles mean those players were getting open to receive passes, and the green center to Moultrie’s means she was delivering them. So…well played, forwards and AMs!

Here’s ACFC, and I’ve included Carlisle-sensei’s comment because it’s perfect as a gem:

Well, he got the road point despite being thoroughly outplayed and outworked, so God seems to be feeling generous towards Big Sam.

Turnover and over.

Here’s how things are going;

Opponent (Result) – 2025	Turnovers
Kansas City (L)	38
Angel City (D)	38

So not better. You do that shit in front of Orlando or Washington or Kansas City and suffer for it. Do in before ACFC and, well, a point is better than none, right?

Well, no. Win at home,draw on the road.

Twenty-one turnovers in the first half again, 17 again in the second. ACFC turned over much less – 24 total – but kind of collapsed in the second half, 14 giveaways to Portland’s 17.

The Thorns’ Biggest Loser was Torpey, six-and-a-half giveaways. Hiatt coughed up six, Castellanos four-and-a-half, Coffey three-and-a-half, Arnold and Reyes three each.

The defenders handed several dangerous opportunities to Angel City, including Hiatt in the 8th and 32nd minutes, Torpey in the 22nd, and Reyes in the 16th. The squad cleaned things up in the second half, so, that’s better. Still; can’t do that stuff against the top four that way you can against Laity’s cackhanded mob.

Corner Kicks

Five, two in the first half. Four long, one short.

Time	Taker	Short/Long?	Result
17′	Coffey	Short	To Castellanos, who hucked into the mixer. This was cleared, recycled to Obaze who shot wide.
30′	Moultrie	Long	Bounced through the pack to Turner at the back post for the equalizer, 1-1.
64′	Moutrie	Long	Into the mob, cleared out to Sugita, then Obaze who belted into Row ZZZ.
83	Moultrie	Long	Cleared out to Sugita, whose terrific long belt forced Anderson into a great save and forced another corner.
84′	Moultrie	Long	Pinged off heads before being cleared to Coffey. Passed to Moultrie who lobbed in, cleared again, recycled, cleared again before falling to ACFC.

A goal and a hell of a great chance, 40% of the corners generating goals or chances? That’s outstanding corner work.

Player Ratings and Comments

Linnehan (45′ – +1/-1) Worked hard for little to show for it, untidy with the ball, and all the more exposed by her halftime replacement…

Hanks (45′ – +13/-3) Holy shit. That’s fucking boss. A +26/-6 over the full ninety? That’s some Sophia Wilson/Great Horan-type shit right there.

Speedy as a thought, Hanks absolutely tore up the LW. If she’d have had anyone close to her pace or in hive-mind with her she could have assisted at least thrice, once in the 57th minute when her diagonal ball was just out of Spaanstra’s reach, again in the 59th minute, when her low cross rolled through the six untouched, and finally in the 78th minute, same thing; nobody on the end of an open cross.

Hanks’ 64th minute run began a good sequence that produced a Turner blocked shot and then the corner.

A better coach than Ken would have seen all this pacey goodness in training and developed a comprehensive attack around it.

Being Ken? Well, okay then.

Turner (80′ – +4/-0 : +1/-0 : +5/-0) It feels graceless to lowrate the Thorns’ only goalscorer, but…same problem here as above; Turner did little of note other than potted a sitter and faded out badly in her long second half stint before giving way to…

Tordin (10 – +5/-0) …who tore up the fucking pitch.

I couldn’t get a decent screenshot of it, but she should really have had a 1v0 opportunity in the 89th minute right after the Fuller-non-shot AC attack shown above.

Moultrie hit a perfectly weighted long pass up to a racing Tordin going shoulder-to-shoulder with her defender. Savy King went down like she’d been shot and Dopka hung the “foul” on Tordin.

Bullshit call that could easily have snatched all the points away. Not a good night for Dopka, great night for Tordin.

Moultrie (+11/-1 : +6/-1 +17/-2) I had Livvy with: four dangerous attacks, three forechecking presses/tackles, four tackles-for-gain, four significant passes, an interception and a smart run. What’s great about that? Nine attacking pluses, eight defensive.

The problem with Moultrie has never been her going forward. It’s that she’s looked slow and sloppy tracking back and when, as he often does, Ken played her as a #8 or hybrid 8/10 she shirked her defensive responsibilities.

She hasn’t done that so far this season.

She’s still not a winger, so Ken’s insistence on playing her wide doesn’t help. But Moultrie is quietly having a fine spring.

Castellanos (73′ – +2/-2 : +1/-2 : +3/-3) Troubling. Despite being played as a sort of AM/false 9 – where she looked dangerous against Kansas City – the reign of Queen Deyna was short. She shot poorly, and contributed no more than a handful of passes to the attack otherwise last Friday.

If Ken is going to start her, Castellanos needs to be better.

Spaanstra (17′ – +5/-1) Another “substitute is better than the starter” problem. I don’t think this was on Spaanstra so much as Reina Deyna having an unqueenly night. Spaanstra should have had the winning goal in the 93rd minute but her shot went right into Anderson’s gloves. Great run, crap finish. Gotta do better than that.

Sugita (+8/-0 : +11/-0 : +19/-0) Woman of the Match.

Is there anything Hina-san can’t do? Attack, defend, create, score…she’s the Complete Package.

Coffey (+2/-1 : +5/-1 : +7/-2) Another strangely muted outing, and particularly troubling because of how ACFC bossed the midfield for much of the match. Shockingly poor work on the Fuller goal, too.

Something’s not working for Coffey so far this season. Ken tends to sit her deeper than really works for her, as a destroyer, which, I think, doesn’t work as well for her as allowing her to push up. His lack of organization and discipline work against her, too.

Torpey (80′ – +4/-6 : +0/-3 : +4/-9) Hot mess. I’m okay with her replacement(s) not being Marie Muller; few players are. But this poor goof? I’ve been unimpressed with many of the recent Matildas, and Torpey’s season so far hasn’t changed that.

McKenzie (10′ – +4/-0) At this point I see little reason to continue starting Torpey. Let the rook try. If she’s not up to it? Well, neither is Torpey, apparently, so at least we’ll know.

Hiatt (+8/-2 : +0/-1 : +8/-1) The turnover section made it sound like I was picking on Hiatt. I’m not. She was the best of the backs against ACFC; her terrific recovery run and crushing tackle on Thompson’s 45th minute run closed down a truly horrifyingly dangerous half-chance only to be repeated less than a minute later. The second half numbers really reflect ACFC drifting out of the match rather than anything problematic in Haitt’s part.

Obaze (+1/-1 : +5/-1 : +6/-2) Fine in general with no big errors, and “steady” is kind of centerback 101.

Reyes (+4/-1 : +4/-1 : +8/-2) Good work on both sides of the ball; solid defensively, progressive passing. Solid outing, tho against an admittedly poor opponent, but that’s all you can ask.

Arnold (+1/-1 : +0/-0 : +1/-1) Another of these “good saves but a shifty concession” Arnold games. What’s odd is that her shot-stopping is usually excellent, but every so often it’s like she vapor-locks and she ships a crap goal.

Keepers have to multi-task; narrow the angles, prepare for the opponent in possession to have a crack but still be aware of potential runners off the ball and the possibility of a lofted cross or low through-ball that may require movement through traffic.

Arnold’s rep comes from penalty stops. That’s the ultimate in univariant keeper situations; just you and the taker. Maybe that’s the problem? Her mind just doesn’t do well once it has to do multivariate analysis?

That said, the other options are a pure rook and a keeper who was an utter tire fire in 2023. So my guess is Arnold continues to start.

Coach Ken: You are what you are, bro.

Your squad looked better against ACFC than in Kansas City. Some of that was your players, young beasts like Hanks and Tordin, old heads like Hina-san and Moultrie (Old? Damn, girl, can you even drink yet..?) playing over the heads.

Some was Angel City; they’re pretty crap.

Again, though, I keep coming back to the whole “Linnehan and Hanks” thing.

Linnehan is fine. She’s usually a solid attacker who has some pace and can score.

Hanks? Holy fuck, man! That’s fucking lightning in a fucking bottle!

If you can’t see that, if you can’t figure out how to use it? What the fuck is your malfunction? Why isn’t she starting? Why doesn’t she have teammates who are hip to her gaff? Why wasn’t anyone there to meet those crosses?

Again…what the fuck do you do in training..?

This club has some excellent pieces. It’s your job – it’s your only job – to assemble those pieces into a machine that grinds up opponents and spits out points.

You lost some powerful pieces this past offseason and preseason. Yes, that makes things more difficult. But the work we saw from the noobs like Tordin and Hanks last Friday suggests you have some potentially powerful replacements.

For Wilson? No. There’s no like-for-like replacement for a generational talent like that unless the league lets you kidnap Temwa Chawinga.

But Hanks looks a hell of a lot like Replacement-Weaver. Tordin looks fantastic; not Replacement Wilson but maybe Wilson-lite?

You need a better RB that Torpey. But you have hella fine players on the roster; Turner, Moultrie, Sugita, Coffey, Castellanos, Reyes, Hiatt. Obaze and Spaanstra are decent. Arnold is no worse than average.

But they need a good system. They need tactics, a plan, organization, discipline, people fitted to roles that match their skillsets.

That’s. Your. Fucking. Job.

Do it.

Do your goddamn job.

Or tell the boss you can’t and let them find someone who can.

Lead, or get the fuck out of the way.