Thorns FC: Who Knew?

Six games into the 2025 season I’m pretty confident that nobody else would have had “Portland away is a trap game for top four opponents” on their bingo card.

I sure as Hell didn’t.

When NJ/NY Gotham FC showed up this past Tuesday here’s where they stood:

“Where my hounds at? Release the bitches!”

Woof. That’s not a good look for Portland and their places on the table reflected that; Gotham fourth (2-2-1, 8pts, 8GF, 4GA, GD+4), Portland ninth (1-2-2, 5pts, 3GF, 5GA, GD-2).

As I concluded after the lost Battle in Seattle; I had a bad feeling about that.

So it was electrifying to see the Thorns come out taking the match to Gotham and nicking a pretty team goal in the seventh minute beginning with Jessie Fleming diming Reyna Reyes with a big switch across field:

Reyes had tons of space but…what to do with it? Maybe Caiya Hanks could help with that?

Hanks put in the run and Reyes put in the pass, and Hanks beat Gotham’s Nealy Martin to the byline.

But what now? The Gotham backline is retreating and, while Reilyn Turner is wide there’s a lot of bodies between her and Hanks and Lily Reale is on Turner’s back.

And it looks like Emily Sonnett is touch-tight on Mimi Alidou. Fuck! Where’s the option?

Right there…because it turns out that Alidou can get a step on Sonnett – sorry, Sonny! – and…

Boom. One-nil Portland.

Who knew?! Right?!

But.

For only about a minute. Because…

Like a mirror image of the Alidou goal.

Bang, 1-1, and boy howdy did that feel familiar. The story of this season to date; one step forward, one step back.

And then the same ugly feeling of losing control of the first half. Here’s Sofascore’s “momentum” plot at halftime:

Ouch. That’s pretty brutal.

The problems were the same problems we’d seen from this squad all season; overrun in midfield and static up front, so no connection out of the back. Fleming and Sam Coffey forced to drop deep with nothing vertical in front of them. Goofy stuff on the flanks; Turner, the notional right wing, lacks a winger’s pace or instincts. Positional chaos; Deyna Castellanos, the supposed center forward, constantly dropping behind Alidou, the supposed ACM, to try and find possession.

At the half the two sides positions looked like this:

Gotham had the better of the end of the first half, too, culminating in a bizarre injury time goalmouth scramble when a Gotham corner was recycled and the looping cross bounced through everyone to Mackenzie Arnold, who had to get down quickly to parry away…

…right to Sonnet! Who, fortunately, blasted right back at Arnold’s shoulder and away.

Ugh. SSDD and it looked like another long, dreary night.

The two clubs came out after the break and it looked like the ugly night was going to play out to it’s brutal conclusion; in the 48th minute Esther picked off an Isabella Obaze pass and forced yet another save out of Arnold. The rebound went to Gotham and someone in blue was offside but, still, fuck.

Then, improbably, this began to happen:
49′ – Jayden Perry dimed Hanks on the run. Hanks put in a sweet cross that both Castellanos and Fleming stumbled over and lost, though.
50′ – Hanks torched Martin again and hit Turner, whose cross to Alidou was blocked out for a Portland throw-in.
51′ – Hanks nicked the ball off Bruninha and was fouled. Castellanos’ free kick was hard to the near post but Ann-katrin Berger got down well to save.
52-58′ – Gotham had a long sequence of possession in Portland’s defensive third but the Thorns kept them in front, defended well, and denied the Bats a shot.
60′ – Hanks hit Alidou whose strong run earned a corner kick, but it went nowhere.

Notice whose name comes up a lot in this sequence? Yeah. Keep that in mind.

61′ – Fleming lobbed a long pass up to Sam Coffey, and…

In the baseball comedy Major League there’s a bit where the Caribbean slugger finally loses patience with his voodoo spirit (who’s supposed to be putting the magic in his bat) and growls “Fuck you, Jobu, I do it myself.” I get the feeling that at that moment Coffey, tired of farkling around with the pointless freelancing and finishing problems, decided “Fuck you, Ken, I do it myself.“.

Coffey ran through the Gotham backline, hit Hanks with a dime, and Hanks, tired of trying to rely on teammates to finish for her, stonked a golazo and suddenly the rout was on.

Over the next half hour Gotham had, literally, nothing. I tallied Portland attacks in the 64th, 65th, 68th, 69th, 72nd, and 79th minutes. In the 72nd minute attack Alidou drew a foul inside the box that sent Perry to the spot; Jayden “Ice Cold” Perry calmly sent Berger the wrong way to make it 3-1.

The 79th minute attack produced another fun team goal; Coffey to Alidou whose run Gotham turned out wide. Alidou looked back inside and found Hanks, whose shot was blocked out to substitute Hina Sugita; Hina-san played a pretty 1-2 with Olivia Moultrie…but Gotham scrambled back to clear the ball.

It went no further than Coffey. Her shot was blocked, but fell to Castellanos, who teed up and banged the ball off Berger into the net, 4-1 Portland and lights out.

Except.

In the fourth minute of injury time Moultrie had her foot on the ball, and Hanks, again, broke downfield. Moultrie dimed her.

This was at 90+4 of the six added minutes.

Most forwards, hell, most players, with 94 minutes of hard graft in their legs, up three goals, would have happily noodled the ball to the far corner and played keepaway to waste time.

But Caiya Hanks is fucking merciless.

She tore at the Gotham goal with only a rattled Berger to beat, intent on ripping one last piece out of Gotham’s heart.

She didn’t; having to slow up a titch to control before shooting, Jess Carter caught Hanks from behind, gave her enough of a shove to clank Hanks’ shot off Berger rather than past Berger, and the final whistle blew.

Okay, then.

This sort of win could be a season-changer…for some teams. “Statement win”, right? “This is who we are!”

We’ll see.

Racing Louisville comes to town this Sunday. They’re awful; 1-1-3, 4pts, 3GF, 9GA, GD-6.

A crippled animal like Racing should be easy meat for a pack of alpha predators, right? And Portland is an now alpha predator? Right?

Who knew!?

Maybe we’ll see who knows this Sunday.

Short Passes

Per OPTA Portland was thoroughly outpassed; 79% completion of only 320 passes to Gotham’s 85% of 486. That tracks with the lopsided possession advantage to the visitors; 61% to 39%…but the final “momentum” diagram shows how 1) well Portland defended and how 2) pointless Gotham’s “possession” was:

Again, because of the short rest I’m not going to wait for our “vaudevillian cane” blogger andre carlisle to post his plots; here’s Sofascore’s player position charts (starters on the left, subs on the right):

That’s…still kind of a mess.

Reilyn Turner just isn’t a winger. Period. She does other good things, but wing play is not one of them. I’d argue that this match goes about 99.7% of the way to establishing Caiya Hanks as “this season’s Morgan Weaver” but the “Who is the starting RW” problem still isn’t solved.

Plus there’s still width issues, and people jammed up in the center of the pitch. We’ll talk about this in the comments some more, but there are still player/role issues with KenBall.

Here’s Gotham:

That left flank in the late match diagram?

Yeah, that’s the “Hanks Effect”. I think it actually has a measurable differential in the gravitational pull of the northern hemisphere.

Turnover and over.

Here’s how things are going;

Opponent (Result) – 2025	Turnovers
Kansas City – Away (L)	38
Angel City – Home (D)	38
North Carolina – Home (D)	32
Utah – Away (W)	25
Seattle – Away (L)	34
Gotham – Home (W)	26

Better. Fourteen turnovers in the first half, only 12 in the second, while Gotham coughed up only seven before the break but 12 in the second to help the field tilt against them

The Thorns’ Biggest Loser was Castellanos with six. Turner coughed up four, Obaze and Alidou three each, Arnold two-and-a-half, Fleming lost twice.

The only real nightmare was the pass Obaze sent directly to Esther in the 48th minute. Several others were iffy, but in general the Thorns were tidy enough, and Gotham futile enough, to nick all the points.

press!

Third match tracking the effect of each side’s press. I counted either a 1) turnover (either from a tackle-for-loss or a mishit forced pass), or a 2) forced retreat or drop-pass that killed off a progressive action, as a pressing “win”.

Here’s the results:

Match time	Gotham presses (wins)(%)	Thorns presses (wins)(%)
0-15′	7(5) (71.4%)	3(2) (33.3%)
15-30′	4(2) (50%)	3(2) (33.3%)
30-45+8′	6(4) (66.6%)	5(4) (80%)
First half	17(11) (64.7%)	11(8) (72.7%)
45-60′	3(3) (100%)	0(0) (0%)
60-75′	4(3) (75%)	4(4) (100%)
75-90+6′	4(3) (75%)	4(3) (75%)
Second half	11(9) (82.8%)	8(7) (87.5%)
Match Total	28(20) (71.4%)	19(15) (78.9%)

My thoughts about this:
1) Gotham is known to be a “pressing team” and they were, and were generally successful, particularly in the first half.
2) Overall, though, they had no answer for Hanks, though (two presses, one win) and that made all the difference.
3) The Thorns best pressers were Hanks (4.5), Fleming (4), and Coffey (2). Nobody else had more then one successful press.
4) The Thorns most victimized by Gotham were Coffey (5) and Castellanos (3).

So yes, Gotham presses, and presses well. No, that wasn’t a critical factor. And Portland did well enough to hold their own.

Here’s the running tally:

Match (Result)	Opponent Press (Success)	Thorns Press (Success)
Utah Away (W)	28/12 (42.8%)	27/15 (55.5%)
Seattle Away (L)	32/23 (71.8%)	21/15 (71.4%)
Gotham Home (W)	28(20) (71.4%)	19(15) (78.9%)

We’ll keep tracking this.

Corner Kicks

Seven. Three in the second, two long, one short.

Time	Taker	Short/Long?	Result
60′	Castellanos	Long	Poor effort all the way over the pack.
65′	Castellanos	Long	Cleared away and lost.
90+4′	Castellanos	Short	Pure timewasting.

Not a thing.

Player Ratings and Comments

Castellanos (+5/-4 : +7/-4 : +12/-8) Hmmm.

So finally got her goal…but. Still not really effective for much of the match. Fades in and out. When she’s good, she’s good…but she’s often not very good. Castellanos is still very easy to shove off the ball and lacks the bite to be an effective center forward.

I’d love to see better from her, but at the moment she still seems to be a curious choice to start at the #9. Seems better at the #10 to the extent Ken plays a #10 (i.e. not much) but we have several players who look as good or better there. Kind of a headscratcher.

Hanks (+9/-0 : +12/-2 : +21/-2) After last match I wondered who Caiya Hanks was; the starter who underwhelmed in Utah or the sub who lit up Lumen.

This match seems to solidify her place as this season’s starting LW; this was a massively “Woman of the Match” performance. Hopefully this was the start of a trend, and not a brief flare of talent. We’ll see. Morgan Weaver might have to fight to get her starting spot back…if Hanks’ run of this form continues.

Alidou (83′ – +6/-0 : +3/-0 : +9/-0) Another player I liked when I saw earlier glimpses, and I liked this full-match outing even more. Nice feel for space (as the goal showed), clever with movement, and good behind the ball, too; four of her nine pluses are defensive.

Hirst (7′ – +4/-0) Good little shift to see out the win.

Turner (70′ – +6/-1 : +1/-1 : +7/-2) Not her fault. Turner lacks the skillset for what Ken is doing with her, but he seems determined to run her out at RW despite other, likely better, options. Still putting in the work and still a decent forward, just not as effective where she has to play.

Moultrie (20′ – +6/-0) As with Hirst; came on, did what needed to be done, so, fine.

Coffey (+5/-0 : +5/-1 : +10/-1) This is more like it. Extra credit for doing it herself.

Fleming (63′ – +8/-1 : +3/-1 : +11/-2) I’d really like to see if Fleming can do the facilitating/distributing job better than Castellanos. Fine as the other half of the double pivot, but seems like there’s an attacker inside her that we aren’t seeing now.

Sugita (27′ – +8/-1) Just as good as ever. Fun to watch, too; she was pressed deep in her own box in the dying minutes and broke the ankles of at least three Bats. She’s like a cuddly kunoichi who will twinkle while cutting your throat so slick you don’t even know you’re dead until your beer comes out over your collar.

Reyes (+2/-1 : +9/-2 : +11/-3) Excellent match, in particular putting a collar on Bruninha and, after she came on for Martin, Midge Purce.

“Ice Cold” Perry (+5/-2 : +5/-1 : +10/-3) Young Perry is looking ever more solid in back, and it was delightful to see her step up and bury the penalty like a veteran. After a shifty start this season’s backline might just be coming together. Again, we’ll have to see how things progress.

Obaze (84′ – +1/-0 : +3/-2: +3/-3) Hmmm. Hard to tell; the Thorns backline did well as a unit, but of the group Obaze looked the least convincing. Not going to downrate her for one game, but has me looking hard at her, because…

Daiane (6′ – +4/-0) …her replacement looked very skilled. Admittedly short minutes and at a point when Gotham was on fire and sinking, but…I’d like to see more.

McKenzie (+2/-0 : +1/-0 : +3/-0) The low number is largely because the Thorns defended 1) well in groups, so no one had to make heroic efforts, and 2) by keeping Gotham in front of them; the high line that was so overrun in Seattle held firm against Gotham, so the fullbacks didn’t have to scramble or get skinned. So don’t be misled by the low numbers; well done as part of the group and fine individually.

Arnold (+2/-0 : +1/-0 : +3/-0) Bixby partisans tend to give Macca a lot of online stick, but she’s what she’s always been, a solid NWSL-grade starting keeper with quick feet and reaction saves, as she showed in the 45+2nd and 48th minutes.

I’m not seeing much daylight between either keeper at the moment. Arnold has looked safe, and Bixby much better than 2023. Right now I’m fine with keeping Arnold #1 so long as she continues this form.

Coach Ken: Well! How about you?

Were you good in this one, or were you lucky? Did you make some subtle second half adjustments, or did your players grab this match by the scruff and, as Sam Coffey might have said, do it themselves?

I honestly don’t see the “second half adjustments”; it looked to me more like Hanks taking the match by storm and Gotham, who’d been sort of farkling about for an hour or so, coming apart.

I’d like to think that this was some sort of watershed, and you will start managing like a boss and this team will storm up the table.

You’ve got the perfect chance to take that next step, too; Racing this Sunday.

Sic ’em, tiger.