Thorns FC: Double Down

We’ve got a week without Wednesday soccer, so I’m going to try and get our match reports caught up.

What’s going to “help” me with that is actually kind of a problem; I don’t have a writeup for the first of the three games last week, the home draw against Angel City FC.

Part of that is on me; I erased the DVR I made of the match because 1) I was running out of storage and had Bay FC coming that Wednesday and 2) foolishly assumed that the NWSL+ website would show the replay as they had been showing all the previous matches.

But part of that is on who-and-whatever-the-fuck-is-NWSL+; they’ve suddenly started just dropping random replays without any detectable system or pattern. As of today (Tuesday 5/26) neither the ACFC or BFC replays are up. WTF, you goofs? I kept the DVR of Bay FC, but for ACFC? I kinda got nothing.

So let’s speed-run through a quick recap of the Angel City match and then dive into the midweek match we do have data for.

Whole Lotta Nothin’

For the ACFC game, well, let’s start with this:

That’s Carlisle-sensei giving both squads and the league’s PR people a hard kick in the pants. The beatings from his report continue…

…until, well, morale didn’t really improve.

Both squads hung up the zero, and given how ACFC had struggled just to get there and Portland was at home, the side-eye kinda has to be directed at the home team.

I sat through this joker live, and I can’t think of a reason to add to or edit the comment I made over on the Stumptown match thread at halftime:

“Forty-six minutes of epic..pointlessness.

What baffles me is that we pressed AC hard in LA and profited by it. Today both squads are jammed up in some sort of offsetting mid-block, and neither seems to have any ideas how to break the other down.”

They never did. Road point taken, Angels. Not a great look from either our Swedish chef or his line cooks, but at least the Angels didn’t manage to nick a crap goal and steal all three, so…ugh. Fine.

Then the midweek match dragged in another California tomato can, the Shitty By The Bay

Bay City Beatdown, or, “Artillery Lends Dignity To What Would Otherwise Be A Vulgar Brawl”

Yeah. It was kind of all like that.

Here’s Carlisle-sensei:

And here’s Sofascore’s “Attack Momentum” plot:

Oof.

You’ll note that Vilahamn let the troops slack off after halftime, and had BFC any actual weapon other than Racheal Kundananji, and had Kundananji any sort of either 1) form or 2) understanding with her teammates, that might have been trouble.

She doesn’t, so it wasn’t.

But at the other end, for most of the match the Thorns “attack” consisted of:
1. Wilson hero-ball,
2. Buildups that fell apart before any real dangerous shot-creation, and
3. Direct play that was usually cooked by poor timing, from the run, the pass, or both.

So it was both good and lucky that M.A. Vignola teed up a poorly-cleared 31st minute corner kick and…

…reminded me forcibly of this:

(Back in the Army of the 1980s these little George Finley cartoons were a common sight in orderly rooms, dayrooms, or first sergeant offices, wherever GIs could hang their I-love-me goodies, so not exactly a big stretch for me.)

After halftime a loooong stretch of fuck-all where Portland sat around picking grass and acting tame and Bay FC kept failing Soccer 101. Until in the 77th minute the Thorns put together a delightfully pretty piece of pure Route One that would have gladdened the heart of the coaching staff of Preston North End playing Bristol Rovers on a rainy Saturday in February, 1963.

Macca Arnold’s hard, low goal kick went to Pietra Tordin in midfield. Tordin snapped off a perfect headed flick that fell to Wilson tear-assing up the right channel.

Wilson’s run unsurprisingly drew all three Bay defenders, who “defended” Wilson as Bay had all match (i.e. like a U-12 backline and a poorly-coached one, at that) so the Thorns striker had a perfect window to lay off a square pas to substitute “wingbackforward” Mallie McKenzie, who finished the dagger to the delight of her teammates, the fans, and McKenzie herself.

If you enjoy Old School direct soccer as I do? It was hella big fun.

But “good soccer”? Ummmm...not so much.

We’ll talk some more about the Thorns metrics and individual performance. But the bottom line is that this was a “must-win” match; Bay FC was shit, and a silverware-worthy squad takes cans like BFC out behind the shed and thrashes all the points out of them.

The Thorns did, so, good enough.

Short Passes

Bay FC with slightly more possession (52-48%) and a fraction better passing accuracy, completing 76% of 404 passes to Portland’s 75% of 379, but pretty much a wash.

Here’s Carlisle-sensei with the passing. First, Portland:

So yes for Wilson.

But it’s not just Tordin’s role that’s changing to fit Wilson’s return. It’s that – yeah, sorry, I hear you groaning, sorry, but I keep banging this drum because it’s a problem and it matters – there’s no real signs that the attackers, including Wilson, all the other forwards, and the midfield, have managed to develop any sort of understanding. There’s s lot of KenBall freelancing, lots of off-timing issues, lots of “looked-great-until-the-final-pass/shot/cross”.

Anyway, here’s Bay FC:

Kinda yes-and-no. The “shell” was there, although it was more packing behind the ball rather than pressing, and Kundananji had her moment or two (so Portland wasn’t always “ready for her” – we’ll talk a lot about that in Reyes’ comment) but when she did Portland was usually ready, and when they weren’t, she didn’t.

Turnover and over.

Here’s how things are going;

Opponent – Venue (Result)	Turnovers
Washington – Away (W)	26
Seattle – Home (W)	11
San Diego – Away (L)	29
Kansas City – Home (W)	23
North Carolina – Away (D)	25
Angel City – Away (W)	22
San Diego – Home (W)	17
Chicago – Away (W)	32
Louisville – Away (L)	25
Angel City – Home (D)	No data
Bay FC – Home (W)	33

Back to “sloppy”; as with much else about this match, Portland got lucky when they needed to, and Bay was too poor to take advantage when Portland wasn’t lucky. Bay was only slightly more tidy (26 total turnovers) but greatly improved after the break (from 18 giveaways to 8) while Portland kept coughing up hairballs, 18 to 15 after halftime.

Reyes was the Biggest Loser, turning over five times, but Muller was only slightly less-sloppy with four-and-a-half turnovers. Cassandra Bogere gave away three-and-a-half times. and Hiatt horked up three. Several more Thorns with two.

Several were scary, including a Bogere giveaway that gave Hannah Bebar a free crack at Arnold that Bebar lofted over the crossbar. The Thorns centerbacks gave Bay far too many good looks, including an Obaze pass to Kundananji in the 32nd minute that produced a Bay corner kick that Kundanaji (again!) headed off the crossbar. Possibly the absolute worst was another Reyes goof, “clearing” a rebound directly into Taylor Huff’s firing arc. Fortunately Huff couldn’t control the ball and Muller cleared the ball out, but that one could easily have been a concession

Press!

Tenth match tracking the 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”.

Bay was the aggressor in the opening half, pressing 45 times, but winning only 25 (55.5%) though 8 of those were ball-winners. The Thorns’ press (and counterpress) was less numerous – 35 total – but slightly more successful (21 wins, 60%) as well as winning the ball 10 times.

After the break Portland sat in, pressing only 24 times (though still quite successfully; 16 wins. 66%, with 6 takeaways) while Bay, with more possession, didn’t need much pressing and didn’t do much (14 total, with 9 wins (64.3%) and 5 takeaways).

Match time	BFC presses (wins)(%)	Thorns presses (wins)(%)
0-46′	45(25) (55.5%)	35(21) (60%)
45-96′	14(9) (64.3%)	24(16) (66%)
Match Total	59(34) (57.6%)	59(37) (62.7%)

My thoughts:
1) Same question for this one as at Louisville; was this “Portland is directed not to press high” (Vilahamn wants to rest legs) or “Portland couldn’t press high” (tired legs, short rest)? Unlike Racing, Bay was too poor to take advantage of the relief.
2) The effect was to pretty much make Portland’s pressing largely irrelevant.
3) I do suspect that Bay’s press did help disrupt Portland’s attack. The goals came from a single piece of good direct play that flew right over the press, and an utterly random defender golazo.
4) Hey, it worked, so good enough. But we’re going to see that the short rest/soft lack-of-press is going to be an issue.

Here’s the running tally:

Match (Result)	Opponent Press (Success)	Thorns Press (Success)
Washington Away (W)	40(27) (67.5%)	69(41) (59.4%)
Seattle Home (W)	61(30) (49.1%)	35(20) (57.1%)
San Diego Away (L)	33(22) (66.6%)	88(40) (45.4%)
Kansas City Home (W)	26(15) (57.6%)	43(23) (53.4%)
North Carolina Away (D)	35(22) (62.8%)	56(26) (46.4%)
Angel City Away (W)	52(37) (71.1%)	61(32) (52.4%)
San Diego Home (W)	45(71) (63.3%)	45(80) (56.2%)
Chicago Away (W)	68(34) (50%)	97(51) (52.2%)
Louisville Away (L)	101(70) (69.5%)	62(35) (56.4%)
Angel City Home (D)	No data	No data
Bay FC Home (W)	59(34) (57.6%)	59(37) (62.7%)

Corner Kicks

Six. Five long, one short, two in the first half, four in the second.

Time	Taker	Short/Long?	Result
30′	Fleming	Long	Into the scrum, pinged up and down a couple of times, cleared but to Vignola, whose cannon shot was unstoppable for the matchwinner.
36′	Fleming	Short	To Wilson, passed around until a Fleming shot was blocked and ran to BFC.
49′	Fleming	Long	Onto Tordin’s head; her snap header flew barely wide left and high. Good effort.
57′	Fleming	Long	Kind of a repeat of the previous service, but Bogere with the header from the near post but wide.
88′	Fleming	Long	Into the pack. Cleared, recycled to Hiatt, whose poor shot was well over the crossbar
90+6′	Fleming	Long	Oddly, with barely seconds to kill, into the scrum rather than short. Luckily BFC couldn’t control and time expired.

One goal and another great chance (Tordin’s 49th minute header). Three other chances/half-chances, and the final should have been a “just tool it around in the corner”, so pretty damn productive, especially for a club that just doesn’t have a good target-type forward.

Player Ratings and Comments

Wilson (+13/-3 : +16/-3 : +29/-6) Monster, obviously the Woman of the Match despite not bagging the goal, but the assist as well as a “straw-that-stirs” kind of game. Yeah she’s back, and scary if your job is trying to stop her.

Muller (86′ – +11/-2 : +2/-0 : +13/-2) Busy and active in the first half, but then kinda checked out after the break. Muller seems to do that. Fitness problems? Credit for doing what she can as a winger, since she’s not really a winger, but just points out the obvious hole in the roster left by the Hanks and Weaver injuries.

Lyles (4′ – +2/-0) No real effect.

Tordin (86′ – +7/-1 : +8/-0 + +15/-1) Good match; as noted by Carlisle, pushed out of her natural #9 spot but doing well making things happen as a withdrawn forward/winger/AM. It’d be great if the Wilson-Tordin-Turner Line was greater than the sum of its parts, but I’m not sure at this point whether it’s a “can’t be” or just a “don’t have the managerial genius to make it be”.

Harney (4′ – no rating)

Alidou (66′ – +9/-3 : +4/-1 : +13/-4) I noticed an intriguing and troubling thing about Alidou in this match.

The 77th minute goal was, as we’ve discussed, set up by a Wilson-run-a-goal that drew the defenders and finished with a simple square pass to Wilson’s left for McKenzie to pot.

In the 57th minute an awful BFC turnover had given Tordin the ball, Tordin had slotted nicely for Wilson to make a similar run at goal. Like her run twenty minutes later Wilson was drawing all the defensive attention, and like on the McKenzie goal…

…Wilson had a teammate open to her left.

In this case, though, the teammate was Alidou:

Wilson didn’t so much look at Alidou; she drove hard to her right and hammered a shot. It was a good, hard shot, but one for which Jordyn Silkowitz was well positioned and…

…parried around her post for the corner kick.

Not necessarily an unreasonable decision from Wilson, but…remember Alidou’s pathetically soft “shot” tht killed a similar breakaway in the second half in Louisville?

I’ll betcha Wilson does.

That she was willing to trust one of her defenders to do better with a setup-pass in the opponent’s 18-yard-box than her supposed-forward-teammate? Brrrr.

If I was Alidou I’d be worried about that. As a fan of the Thorns I’m worried about that, too.

McKenzie (24′ – +3/-0) I loved McKenzie’s incredulous joy at scoring her first professional goal like an adorable fluffy kitten. Just priceless.

Fleming (+7/-4 : +7/-2 : +14/-6) It was hard to tell how well the DMs did, Bay being so dreadful. Decently, at least, especially pressing and forechecking, and Fleming was, as she’s often been, the steadier of the two. Good match but, again, against a very poor opponent.

Bogere (86′ – +10/-4 : +1/-0 : +11/-4) Offset generally good work defensively with a pretty awful turnover and a troubling defensive derp in the first half, then faded badly after the break. It’s game like this that make me worry about her a bit. Just a bit, mind.

Immethun (4′ – +2/-0) Kind of have to wonder if she, like Harvey and Lyles, will ever be more than Marianas-Trench-deep-depth.

Reyes (+8/-3 : +1/-6 : +9/-9) What the fuck happened to you during halftime? Did you smoke out in the locker room can? Finish that half bottle of Mad Dog? Drop a microdot? Because you went completely to Hell in the second half. Everything from heading directly to your opponent inside your own 18 to the Huff delivery to losing track of Kundananji on the 60th minute corner she headed off the crossbar to getting skinned, looking baffled and losing your mark…

This isn’t like you. I dunno what happened, but I sure hope it was a freakish one-off.

Obaze (+3/-2 : +2/-1 : +5/-3) Much better. Like the DMs, it’s hard to tell if the backline was playing that well, or whether Bay was just that poor, but other than Reyes the other three looked pretty solid. Obaze, in particular, had to work her ass off covering Reyes’ walkabouts in the second half.

Hiatt (+1/-2 : +4/-1 : +5/-3) Same-same.

Vignola (+8/-3 : +6-0 : +14/-3) On the other hand Vignola had a genuinely good match, including, obviously, the goal. Like McKenzie, M.A’s over-the-top excitement and joy were a big part of the fun of that, too. Well played!

Arnold (+0/-0 : +4/-1 : +4/-1) Bay didn’t threaten her goal often, but when they did – mostly in the flurry of attacks between the 50th and 60th minutes, which was a dangerous as the Baywatch got – Arnold came up big three times. Oi oi oi!

Coach Vilahamn: I’m not sure what to say about this guy yet.

If “you’re as good as you’re record says you are”, well…he’s pretty damn good. This match took the squad back top, and that’s tough to argue against. Eleven matches in the Thorns were sitting on 23 points, the best start to a Portland season since 2013, IIRC, and the club won the league that season. The next best season was one of the Shield years (2021, I think).

But.

I keep seeing some KenBall things, particularly on the attacking end, that makes me wonder if the record is lying, or, at least, maybe sorta-kinda shading the truth.

I think we’re going to have to see more of this squad this season before we know better. How about you? How are you feeling about the club so far?