Thorns FC: Laughing at clouds

This writeup is 1) punitively late (because the replay didn’t turn up until last Friday, which is what I spent doing rather than more entertaining things, and 2) difficult to write without referring not just to the match preceding it (the 1-1 draw with Chicago here) but also the match following; another 1-1 home draw, this time to Houston.

And I finally just gave up, because it’s hard not to see the three matches as the 2026 Thorns squad writ large. Each had a set of very similar behaviors from Portland’s players and, presumably, coaches (since that’s who set things up before as well as management during the matches). They’re the same goddamn things we’ve been banging on about all season:

The attack never really coheres into an “attacking system”, a well-connected, mutually-supporting interplay of players who clearly understand each other, who anticipate (and create) accurate passes and move into space and build up through each other to tear into opposing defenses, and

The defending, while it may be anywhere from decent to heroic at times, is liable to break down at some point or points, whether through a lack of collective understanding (there’s that word again) and discipline, or through individual error, and concede.

The result is that goals-for don’t match the xG (that is, the “post-shot xG’ or “xG on target” is well below the expected goals-for) or the xG is itself punishingly low, and that the goals-against or xG-against is unexpectedly high given the quality of the opponent.

And, I should add, the Thorns’ run of play often seems to lack, for loss of a better word, “urgency”.

Good teams, really dangerous teams, are not fun to play. They’re brutal, they’re bullies; they knock you down and kick you when you’re down. They put you to the sword early, or their defense grinds you down and beats you up and sends you away in the shamed futility of a one-nil defeat.

The Thorns…are not that team, and especially not over the past three matches, including this one as the middle of the three.

Looking at the scoreline you wouldn’t think it. 1-4 in Orlando’s house? Dude! That’s a fucking hiding! Right!? You’re telling me that the Thorns didn’t knock the Pride down and kick them?

Yes. That’s exactly what I’m saying.

Oh, Portland came out firing, sure.

Nina Nijstad scored in the 3rd minute. Pietra Tordin nearly ran onto a Sophia Wilson through ball two minutes later. In the 14th minute Nijstad fed Reilyn Turner’s good run…but Turner fired directly at Orlando keeper Cosette Morché (who, credit where it’s due, played a solid match in a losing cause).

In the 17th minute the Thorns absolutely should have scored. “Should” as in “WTFFFFF#$%@#!!#!”.

Wilson drove through Orlando’s central defense in one of the most frightening good attacks I think I’ve ever seen from her and I’ve seen quite a few of those. She fired at Morché from pointblank range, and the Orlando keeper could only block it – right back to Wilson! Morché then went full-gymnast and kick-saved Wilson’s riposte – into the scrum right in front of her goal! Several players, including Tordin, took whacks at the loose ball – until Morché fell on it.

See the third and fourth “good/great shots” on Carlisle-sensei’s map? The two that add up to 0.81 of Portland’s total xG? Like, almost a quarter of the Thorns expected goals?

Yeah, those. Holy shit.

A minute later Tordin served Wilson, who shimmied around her defender, but fired right into Morché again.

After that there was about ten minutes of not much from both sides. In the 27th minute, Oihane Hernández hacked down Caiya Hanks inside the Orlando 18. Wilson potted the spot-kick to put the visitors up two.

Two minutes later Solai Washington skinned Marie Muller and squared to Ally Lemos to pull the home side back to one down.

And then…Portland seemed to just fucking lose interest in the match.

Seriously.

My notes show Portland with nothing of value through to halftime. Orlando had dangerous chances or half-chances in the 32nd, 35th, and 42nd minutes. Portland? Crickets.

After the break? Nothing changed.

Portland had an attack or three – the closest to “dangerous” was a Wilson shot wide in the 52nd minute – while Orlando kept nibbling away, getting more and more dangerous. The nibbles turned to bites and then the fucking fangs really came out.

The Sofascore “momentum” plot shows that second half terror particularly well:

The really scary bit? That red box that represents the 66th through 70th minutes, during which Orlando just walked around Portland’s goal kicking on the fucking door repeatedly.

In the 66th minute Washington (again; the woman was a genuine pest all match) beat Mallie McKenzie to the byline for a corner kick. Corner #1 went into the scrum, forcing Reyna Reyes to head over the byline. Corner #2; headed on goal but cleared away, again, for corner #3. That service forced Mackenzie Arnold to box over her crossbar for fucking corner #4. That one produced a shot (that Carolyn Calzada blocked) before a 71st minute Orlando foul finally put an end to the seemingly endless chain of corners.

Watching this thing live? It felt like the equalizer was absolutely coming, inevitable as the humidity, inescapable as the rain that had been drenching the fetid Orlando swamp all afternoon.

Instead?

Morgan Weaver lightning struck.

Completely against the run of play, out of absolutely nowhere, substitute Cassandra Bogere fed Weaver a pretty set-up pass, and Weaver rared back and just belted the living fuck out of the matchball.

Tattooed that fucker. Y’know how when the replay shows the ball in flight, how when the striker just puts her boot right through the damn thing, how it just sails, barely turning in flight, as it seeks its target like a missile. That was what this one did.

The ball flew 25 yards, on a rope, over Morché at hopeless full stretch, into the top corner and suddenly it was 1-3 and whatever energy the preceding half-hour and change had infused into Orlando just disappeared, dissipated, dissolved, and the final goal (a lovely finish from substitute Renee Lyles, I have to say) was an afterthought.

It was the shocking reversal of fortune that was the Weaver goal that shut Orlando down. I’m not kidding; at 71 minutes it felt like the Orlando goal was surely coming, that the Pride would scrape out the draw, that Portland was doomed to drop points from a winning position (again!), and then…damn.

I said the scoreline was deceiving, and it sure as Hell has deceived. In her writeup of the Houston match Stumptown stringer Emma Swett called this one “…their statement 4-1 victory in Orlando…”. After the final whistle in Orlando I read happy fans celebrating the Return of Weaver (and we’ll talk about that in depth when we get to Houston here…) and rejoicing like we’d won the Champions Cup.

No.

The backline and DMs did damn good work putting a collar on Barbara Banda, something they’d clearly been instructed to do. Three shots, including a block and another off-target. McCutcheon and Yates got only six shots between them, one blocked, two off-frame. The Lemos goal was a Weaverish seeing-eye belt from distance, and of the other attempts only McCutcheon’s 8th minute doorstep that went right at Arnold was even close.

So this was a road win, which was great. It saw several players convert who had been working hard and finally got the payoffs. The defending bent but didn’t break.

But.

The issues we’ve seen.

That we’ll see again when Houston arrives here.

Were, and are, all still there.

Short Passes

Possession; Orlando 53%, Portland 47%. Passing; Orlando 83% completion of 376 passes, Portland 85% of 342.

Meh. Pick’em. Statement? Sure don’t see it there, either.

Here’s the passing plots, starting with Portland.

“Goals change games”, right? Gonna revisit that when we talk about the Houston match, yabetcha.

Orlando:

Yep. Poor team with shit defense (sorry, Morché, you did what you could…) gives up repeated goals. Film at eleven.

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
Kansas City – Away (L)	29
Utah – Home (D)	23
Louisville – Home (W)	21
Seattle – Away (L)	33
Denver – Away (L)	33
Gotham – Home (D)	23
Utah – Away (L)	17
Boston – Away (W)	17
Orlando – Home (W)	24
Denver – Home (W)	19
Gotham – Away (D)	21
Washington – Home (L)	23
Chicago – Home (D)	18
Orlando – Away (W)	22

Sloppy, sloppy. Luckily for Portland other than Lemos the Pride couldn’t do anything with them. Orlando was surprisingly tidy, losing only 12.

Muller was the Sorta-Biggest-Loser with three, including a horrific 45th minute pass directly to Lemos that forced Jayden Perry into a heroic tackle to kill off the resulting Orlando attack. Several others lost a couple each. Orlando couldn’t do much with them, between Portland’s backline and, well, Orlando.

Press!

Twenty-fourth 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”.

Neither side pressed particularly hard, or particularly successfully; that is, while the individual pressing wasn’t “ineffective”, especially Orlando’s, the resulting effects weren’t really game-changing (except for some Thorns organization issues which we’ll discuss in just a bit)

Match time	Pride presses (wins)(%)	Thorns presses (wins)(%)
0-45+1′	23(28) (82.1%)	26(16) (61.3%)
45-90+3′	10(6) (60%)	13(7) (53.8%)
Match Total	38(29) (76.3%)	39(23) (58.9%)

We’ve discussed this before, but one of the irking constants of the Vilahamn 4-1-4-1 defensive set (he runs a notional 4-2-3-1 but when the opponent is in possession Fleming usually drops into a single #6 and the other DM (Nijstad or Bogere) pushed up into the AM/winger line) is how easy it is to pass through, particularly in front of midfield.

The problem begins with Wilson as the only “high press” player. So, when the opponent rounds (or passes past) Wilson…

…there’s usually space either on the touchlines, or in the gaps behind the front four and in front of Fleming, as there is here.

In this case Orlando’s Luana doesn’t take possession and turn; she dummies, and the ball runs to McCutcheon near the center circle. Fleming is there, but she has no support, so when McCutcheon shields Fleming off the pass is on, through midfield…

…and right through Portland’s backline.

In this case luckily for Portland Washington got a late jump, Calzada hustled back, and the danger was ended. But how many times have we seen this? Seems like the gaffer and his staff might want to think about that a bit.

One thing that didn’t help either squad was that, just like in the screenshots above, passing out of or around either side’s press, or turning away from it was very doable. Neither got real turnover production from their efforts; Portland a total of 5 turnovers from their 23 successful presses, Orlando only 6 from their 29.

Instead, what usually happened was that, even if they couldn’t pass through it, the pressed team would just drop or lateral-pass their way back out and try another approach somewhere else. A lot of the “nothing much happened” blank spaces in my match notes are where one side was dinking the ball around looking for openings and not finding them.

My thoughts:
1) Not much here, except
2) The Thorns don’t seem to have a particularly sophisticated press, or seem to want one. Now and then they have an opponent that insists on jamming their heads into the mangle. But it’s not really because the Thorns have a well-organized press.

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%)
Kansas City Away (L)	52(29) (55.7%)	34(20) (58.8%)
Utah Home (D)	99(55) (55.5%)	60(31) (51.6%)
Louisville Home (W)	55(31) (56.3%)	28(13) (46.4%)
Seattle Away (L)	67(46) (68.6%)	66(35) (53.0%)
Denver Away (L)	46(24) (52.1%)	53(27) (50.9%)
Gotham Home (D)	60(32) (53.3%)	58(86) (67.4%)
Utah Away (L)	86(61) (70.9%)	70(38) (54.2%)
Boston Away (W)	84(55) (65.4%)	83(44) (53%)
Orlando Home (w)	94(57) (60.6%)	87(55 (63.2%)
Denver Home (W)	87(55) (63.2%)	60(32) (53.3%)
Gotham Away (D)	42(34) (80.9%)	90(49) (54.4%)
Washington Home (L)	43(30) (69.7%)	64(35) (54.6%)
Chicago Home (D)	42(27) (64.2%)	54(33) (61.1%)
Orlando Away (W)	38(29) (76.3%)	39(23) (58.9%)

Corner Kicks

Four. Two in each half. All long

Time	Taker	Short/Long?	Result
1′	Fleming	Long	Morche’ easy take.
21′	Fleming	Long	Towards the near post, cleared away.
49′	Fleming	Long	Curled over the byline for a goal kick.
90+3′	Fleming	Long	Fell to Bogere at the near post; not a bad effort but Morche’ was there and the final whistle blew.

Nothing. The last-second chance was good but wasn’t really needed, and the others were wasted, particularly the third. A player of Fleming’s quality shouldn’t really miss that.

Player Ratings and Comments

Wilson (+12/-1 : +8/-3 : +20/-4) Woman of the Match, tons of good hustle, passing, running off the ball, set-ups…and yet…

Another “how the fuck do you even miss that?” entry in the Wilson Run Of Play Futility Diary.

Wilson has scored in three of Portland’s last five games…but she hasn’t scored in the run of play since the Denver win here at the end of August. Scoring from the penalty spot is a striker’s skill, too, but speaking as a goalkeeper that’s more an issue of technique and confidence as opposed to the skills of a player like Wilson, a line-leading center-forward that the squad leans hard on to get points from open play.

I think she’s got the yips. And, given how central Wilson is to this team’s success, I hope I’m wrong, or if not, that she works them out most quick smart.

Hanks (71′ – +4/-1 : +2/-0 : +6/-1) Post-injury Caiya Hanks still has a ton of speed, which is a big reason she forced her defender into a clumsy foul and a penalty. On the other hand – and some measure of this applies to all the other Thorns forwards and AMs – I still don’t see her as a part of a working “attacking system”.

The current squad is loaded with attacking talent, as each of the players have shown individually at one time or another in one match or another. What they don’t seem to share is a deep understanding of each other and how to combine to make them all more dangerous as an attacking unit. There seldom seems to be a move or moves and passes or combination of moves, passes and shots that jump out as “Oh look, there they go, that’s a classic Hanks-Wilson (Weaver-Wilson/Turner-Hanks/&tc, &tc…) combination!”

That might be individual or personality disconnection. But more likely it’s a product of coaching without a vision of how that might be developed, a sort of “throw ’em out there to figure it out” sort of shrug.

I don’t think that how soccer coaching works.

No, it’s not football where everything is scripted. But there are ideas of how good attackers work together, and given the quality of so many of the forwards on this roster, you’d think it wouldn’t be difficult to get those ideas to work.

Lyles (19′ – +3/-0) Nicely finished goal and a couple of nice passes and runs. Saw out the win, too, so, fine.

Tordin (85′ – +4/-1 : +3/-1 : +7/-2) I thought that Tordin was fairly ineffective in Orlando; her best moment came in clearing out defenders for Nijstad to score, but beyond that I didn’t see much of the sort of work she can do and has done with Wilson.

I don’t know how much of that was her and how much was Wilson (who seems to have fixed the idea that she needs to shoot whenever she can regardless of where her teammates are or what they’re doing – another big “yips” red flag). I doubt it was Orlando’s defense. Either way, a hard day’s work for little joy.

Harvey (5′ – +1/-0) Contribution on the Lyles goal was pretty much all I saw.

Turner (53′ – +7/-3 : +0/-0 : +7/-3) Looked sparky early then flatlined, and kind of the same as the Tordin comment.

It’s possible that Wilson is the sort of talent that makes her “uncoachable”. Some of the games greatest strikers are said to have been like that, people like Eric Cantona or Garrincha or Diego Maradona. I don’t believe that Wilson is a Cantona, but it might be one possibility for why, between three head coaches now, there doesn’t seem to be a coherent, recognizable “Sophia Wilson Thorns” the way there was a “Christine Sinclair Thorns” and a Lindsey Horan Thorns (and a Tobin Heath Thorns, for that matter).

Great players are like Jupiter-size planets; their creativity and soccer intelligence are a gravity well that pulls and bends the teammates around them. Sinclair was one. Marta is (or, in her prime, was) one. And Wilson surely is one.

Great teams can be built around players like that, but it takes the kind of coaching that understands how those players work, how their gravity affects their teammates, and applies that in the building.

What does that all mean?

We’ll get there.

Weaver (37′ – +6/-0)

After Chicago here I mourned what felt like the passing of Morgan Weaver, the Happy Warrior. Big injuries can do that, and Weaver’s was a very big injury. I’d argue that we still don’t really know if Weaver can ever regain the ferocity and drive that lit her play from within. But in Orlando?

None of that mattered.

Weaver scored, scored a gorgeous, improbably wonderful goal, and the explosion of joy and love that burst all around and from her was a memory I’ll treasure long after she’s hung ’em up. I’m happy for her, happy for those who love her, and that’s enough for the day.

Fleming (+4/-0 : +3/-1 : +7/-1) Obviously the plan for this one was “Fleming back/Nijstad up”. It succeeded, though it made Fleming’s afternoon look like a grinding slog. But sometimes that’s how a destroyer has to go to work.

Nijstad (71′ – +7/-2 : +1/-0 : +8/-2) Pretty goal, fairly solid defending (though I thought Nijstad pushed the caution card envelope pretty hard), and an excellent first half. Looked like she ran out of gas after the hour and, unlike he’d been doing in the recent past, Coach Vilahamn got her off in time and fresh legs on, so good work from both.

Bogere (19′ – +7/-2) Damn good shift on both sides of the ball, including an assist. Just a reminder that you’ve got solid depth on this roster, coach. Use it!

Reyes (+5/-0 : +8/-2 : +13/-2) I’m not wading into the “Why are you not playing Reyes!?!” fever swamps. I don’t see these players everyday and the coaching staff does. That said, Reyes laid down a solid marker in Orlando. Mind, it didn’t hurt that That Damn Washington Woman was on the other side of the field tormenting Muller instead. Still. Reyes did damn good work shutting down McCutcheon and joining the team effort to successfully stifle Banda, so, that’s just fine.

Perry (+8/-1 : +2/-3 : +10/-4) The centerbacks, too, had a decent match, and Perry was one very busy defender. Couple of things:
– Looked gassed by the hour; Banda skinned her in the 50th minute, Luana owned her a minute later, and looked overwhelmed by the barrage of corner kicks in the Four Minutes of Terror. Hung on, though, until Weaver took the pressure off.
– Picked up another yellow. Perry is fifth on the caution table, 6 yellows in 20 matches. Not a list you want to be high up on.

Calzada (+0/-0 : +4/-0 : +4/-0) Perry without the yellow, so that’s just fine, too.

Muller (53′ – +4/-4 : +0/-1 : +4/-5) Muller’s numbers look bad because her opponents, largely You Know Who, were making her look bad, and I’m not convinced that M.A. Vignola, or Reyes for that matter, would have done that much better, as witnessed by…

McKenzie (37′ – +5/-5) …her replacement’s PMR numbers. Portland’s right defensive flank was a tough place to play in Orlando.

Arnold (+2/-0 : +2/-0 : +4/-0) Not really at fault on the concession (at least partially screened, or so it looked to me). Big save against Yates in the 35th minute, and from the corner-kick scrum in the 70th. Came up when she had to, which is kind of all you can ask of your keeper.

Coach Vilahamn: I’m going to just put a pin in this for now, but I’m seeing some returning issues – returning as in “seeing the same things match after match” – that make me concerned about this.

Obviously happy on the day, though, which is good enough for now. Steal every ray of happiness you can when you can, for surely there will be dark days ahead and those memories will lighten them.

Which isn’t such a bad note to end this on.