Thorns FC: Fair enough…

Dropping three points at home never feels okay.

That said, dropping three points to the runaway overwhelming 2025 Shield favorite?

Okay. That’s fair enough.

It’s not an insult to the 2025 Thorns to admit that the 2025 Kansas City Current is just flat-out a better squad. Better on paper, better on the pitch, better in the technical area. They just are. They’re better than everyone this season; even Orlando is fucking twelve points adrift and without Barbara Banda? Well…

So my “hopes” going into last Saturday’s match, such as they were, were that Portland play a solid game and not embarrass themselves. Grind out a tough, tight match and possibly even hope to nick a goal and a result of some kind.

Well, that lasted about a minute.

That’s how long it took the Current to work the ball down near the byline and for the entire Portland squad to choose between napping (whoever up front or in the midfield had been tasked with picking up late runners like Ms. Wheeler steaming up past the penalty arch there) or ballwatching (pretty much everyone else in back).

What’s funny-but-not-like-a-clown about that is that 1) the match announcing crew beat up Reyna Reyes for letting Nichelle Prince “drag her out of position”, while 2) at least one Thorn wasn’t fixated on Izzy Rodriguez’s cross, and that’s who was actually supposed to be picking up Wheeler; Jayden Perry.

Note the raised arm in the red circle? Yep. Perry looked up, saw Wheeler running and waving like a character in a New York film hailing a cab, waved in a “hey, anyone gonna pick up her?” kinda way, and then just forgot and went back to ballwatching, so…

…bang, matchwinner.

What’s kind of more frustrating about that is that after the first-minute derp the match was pretty even…

…except for, again, Portland’s finishing. KCC got two goals in shots-on-goal worth about a goal-and-three-quarters, while Portland got about a goal-and-a-half’s worth of decent looks, then shanked or missed or otherwise failed on them all.

The other problem? This:

That’s Kansas City’s league-leading defense completely nerfing Portland’s attack.

Which wasn’t exactly rocket science, since the Thorns are missing their paciest attackers; Ken put a different frontline out which featured Deyna Castellanos at the center-forward in a 4-2-3-1 (which caused much wailing and gnashing of online teeth, let me say…).

That wasn’t really the problem, though, as we’ll discuss in the comments.

The “problem” is that with Jessie Fleming underneath as ACM and Olivia Moultrie and Reilyn Turner as LM/RM the entire attack was slow enough to be timed with a sundial.

While from the other side of the pitch KCC was doing this; outlet pass…

…followed by through ball…

…and two passes put Temwa Chawinga’s all the way through the entire Thorns squad free on goal.

Ouch.

See what I mean? These people are just. That. Good. Well-designed, well-trained, well-coached. They look like a lock for the Double this season, so it’s no shame to lose a tight match to them, even at home.

Still…Kenball Matchday 17 – same shit, different day; defensive lapses, slow-moving, uncreative attack, failure to finish.

That’s the really frustrating part.

Short Passes

From Sofascore’s “momentum” plot:

Pretty even. The scoreline doesn’t really show how close both sides kept this one. Portland actually did have a chance to “grind out a tough, tight game and nick a goal” except, well…what we said.

Here’s Carlisle-sensei’s fine passing charts, first Portland:

In the word’s of sensei’s koan: “KenBall looks like KenBall regardless of the opponent or the outcome, so as usual we see the tight jam of bodies up the middle, with the “wingers” tucked inside and the fullbacks providing what little width there is”.

Here’s Kansas City::

Okay then.

Turnover and over.

Here’s how things are going;

Opponent – Venue (Result)	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
Louisville – Home (D)	16
Orlando – Home (W)	18
San Diego – Away (D)	32
Houston – Away (W)	21
Bay FC – Away (L)	No data
Washington – Home (W)	16
Chicago – Home (W)	22
Washington – Away (L)	27
Seattle – Home (W)	20
Carolina – Away (D)	26
Kansas City – Home (L)	35

Hell and fucking disaster.

The turnover thing was so bad that even the clueless announcers caught on to it, harping on the need for Portland to be “cleaner with the ball”. Yeah, no shit, Sherlock. You do this sort of giveaways against Utah and you might get by. Against KCC? Fuuuuck, no.

The “winners” in the Biggest Loser competition were a tie between Hiatt and Perry with six each, but Sugita and Coffey were right behind with five each. Castellanos, Fleming, and Turner all coughed up three each.

Easily the single worst was Fleming’s awful backpass to Bia Zaneratto in the 45th minute that the Brazilian fed to Chawinga, whose bullet ricocheted off Macca Arnold’s right post. Off and out, or this one would have been over by halftime.

Press!

Thirteenth 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”. If two players were involved in a press each received a half mark (for attempts) and a half credit for successes.

Portland tried, God love ’em, without middling success at first then decreasing success as the match wore on and desperation increased. Kansas City just had to keep Portland in front of them, and did

Match time	KCC presses (wins)(%)	Thorns presses (wins)(%)
0-15′	5(3) (60%)	14(7) (50%)
15-30′	7(3) (42.8%)	12(8) (66.6%)
30-45+2′	12(6) (50%)	12(8) (66.6%)
First half	24(12) (50%)	36(23) (63.8%)
45-60′	8(3) (37.5%)	5(4) (80%)
60-75′	5(3) (60%)	6(2) (33.3%)
75-90+5′	6(5) (83.3%)	3(3) (100%)
Second half	19(11) (57.8%)	14(9) (64.2%)
Match Total	43(23) (53.4%)	50(32) (64%)

My thoughts:
1) This was the other side of the North Carolina coin. There I noted that both sides pressed well, so “That meant that the match would be largely decided by “who finished better” and “who made one less disastrous defensive error”.
2) Here both sides are kinda of meh; Portland tried but the first-half success was marred by a) “a disastrous defensive error”, b) turnovers, and c) failure to finish, and then Kansas City sat in and passed around and Chawinga finished-better Lightning struck.
2) Four Thorns pressed hard, two with some success; Sugita won six of her eight challenges, Coffey four of six-and-a-half, but Fleming only three of eight attempts. Castellanos won only half, three of six tries.
3) Most effective? Alidou won two of two and Obaze won two of her three, .
4) The most effective? Sam Coffey and Reyes both perfect three of three, Hina-san four of five.
5) On the receiving end Fleming and Coffey both went into six KC challenges. That didn’t end well, both losing four of the six. Hina-san lost three of four, Turner two of four, Perry all three.

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%)
Louisville Home (D)	34/25 (73.5%)	14/8 (57.1%)
Orlando Home (W)	28/17 (60.7%)	43/24 (55.8%)
San Diego Away (D)	18/18 (100%)	100/36 (36%)
Houston Away (W)	27/17 (62.9%)	42/23 (54.7%)
Bay FC Away (L)	No data	No data
Washington Home (W)	31(15) (48.3%)	61(48) (78.6%)
Chicago Home (W)	31(21) (67.7%)	51(39) (76.4%)
Washington Away (L)	18(17) (94.4%)	25(12) (48%)
Seattle Home (W)	51(27) (52.8%)	42(33) (78.5%)
Carolina Away (D)	47(26) (55.3%)	59(39) (66.1%)
Kansas City Home (L)	43(23) (53.4%)	50(32) (64%)

Very much the same situation as the previous match; Portland pressed better, but not enough to change the game state, so the game wasn’t decided by the pressing.

Corner Kicks

Four, three long, one short, two in each half

Time	Taker	Short/Long?	Result
3′	Coffey	Long	onto Obaze’s head, back up in the air, cleared out but recycled into another corner.
4′	Coffey	Long	Onto Turner’s head, but the header was right at Lorena. Good effort, good keeping.
66′	Coffey	Long	Into the mixer, cleared away long
74′	Coffey	Short	Coffey tried a 1-2 with Castellanos, but Coffey was stripped of the ball on the return.

Two headed efforts? Not bad, and Turner’s really was promising. So not awful, just, like the rest of the game, just not quite.

Player Ratings and Comments

Castellanos (81′ – +7/-2 : +7/-1 : +14/-3) This may well be the first match since April in which Reina Deyna showed up. Fast, dangerous, clever; her sweet weaving run in the 75th minute almost produced a chance but for Lorena’s quick hands. I’d love to think this “is the real Castellanos” but we’ve been here before…

Castellanos took lots of stick on the Stumptown thread for putting a bootthrough the ball: “OMFG! Why did she shoot there! Turner (insert name here) was wide opennnnn!!!!”

Well, actually, no:

Castellanos shot largely because her “wingers” weren’t there to pass to.

A lot of that was Kansas City; like we’ve said, their defending is the best in the league. But a lot of that is Turner and Moultrie just lack the pace to get open. See Turner in the screenshot above? Yep, that’s Hailie Mace ball-side-goal-side of her and Turner couldn’t get space on her. Moultrie couldn’t. Fleming couldn’t. And that was how it went all game.

Dufour (9′ – no rating)

Moultrie (+7/-3 : +9/-4 : +16/-7) Mixture of good ideas and good positioning marred by her lack of pace – which was really noticeable against the Current – and just as part of a over-deliberate, slow-developing attack where more pace and incisiveness were needed.

Fleming (58′ – +3/-3 : +0/-0 : +3/-3) My guess is nursing a knock. Looked wandered and out of ideas and made uncharacteristic blunders like the backpass giveaway. A match to forget.

Alidou (32′ – +4/-0) Sparky, and had the single best Thorns chance of the night, a 66th minute near-post rocket that forced Lorena into perhaps her most frantic reaction same all match. Good save, too. So a good shift from Mimi Alidou on a tough hot day.

Turner (72′ – +3/-1 : +2/-2 : +5/-3) xG 0.1, PSxG 0.0. Sorry, but that don’t feed the bulldog.

Tordin (18 – +3/-0) The other thing that kicked up online quite a bit was the “…why aren’t Turner and Tordin starting togetherrrrrr???”

I kinda get that; the two seem to play well off each other, and both are among the paciest Thorns not named “Hanks”. And I’m not sure that they might not have done so against KCC.

That said, they started together the previous match in Carolina, and between them had one good chance (xG > 0.1) each and no goals. And Castellanos was having a damn solid match. So could the Terrible Twosome done better? Well, Kansas City’s defense is…yeah, I know. Done that.

We don’t really know.

Coffey (+8/-1 : +7/-2 : +15/-3) Another match, another evening of good DM work and attacking creation. Against a lesser opponent, perhaps…

Sugita (+6/-2 : +6/-7 : +12/-9) Unusually sloppy in possession in the second half, and I’d love to blame the sultry heat but on the gal from sultry Kyushu? Sorry, not buying it.

All her usual good (passing, footwork, defending), and all the usual “why aren’t Hina-san’s shots more dangerous?” and I still have no idea why not.

Perry (+1/-2 : +4/-4 : +5/-6) The goat on the Wheeler goal and got smoked on Chawinga’s goal-scoring run, as well, so could have done better.

Hiatt (+5/-2 : +4/-6 : +9/-8) Like her unit as a whole; decent in general but a couple of shocking errors that made everything else less effective.

Obaze (82′ – +9/-0 : +2/-1 : +11/-1) Few defenders can say they fought Chawinga to a finish, but Obaze put a collar on her most of the match. Damn good work.

McKenzie (8′ – +4/-1) Solid shift, with some big late-match tackles.

Reyes (73′ – +4/-3 : +5/-0 : +9/-3) Like Obaze, good solid match – especially going forward, which is very much a Kenball thing – and not at fault on the concessions. Tough, but sometimes soccer is cruel that way.

Spaanstra (17′ – no rating) Peculiar substitution, frankly.

Arnold (+1/-0 : +0/-1 : +1/-2) I gave her a minus for the Chawinga goal; I think she could have done better than getting five-holed. Two other moments, one outstanding (big save off Chawinga in the 39th minute), the other not so much, a poor move off her line in the 67th minute tangled her up with Hiatt and left the goal at Chawinga’s nonexistent mercy had the Malawian had any, but Chawinga got the ball caught under her feet and so Arnold escaped.

Coach Ken: Not disgraceful, and yet.

This one had all the frustrating KenBall features. Slow, indecisive attack. Defensive errors. Oddball XI and sub decisions (not just in general but suggesting the coaching staff hasn’t done their oppo research).

I can’t really beat up the gaffer for losing to Vlatko and Kansas City. They’re good.

It just seems like the Thorns have some options that might have made it harder for the Vlatkoites, and Ken didn’t, or couldn’t, or wouldn’t see them.

Sometimes you just have to wonder.