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| Tirelessly searching for answers to today's vexing questions |
When the New England Revolution’s Dylan Borrero went down awkwardly and was stretchered off around the 20th minute, I remember looking at the Revs’ somewhat headless attach (aka, Justin Rennicks) and wondering whether they could keep up with a mostly all-there FC Cincinnati attack. I would have done better to recall a note from my very own preview for the game:
“...unless Cincy fans see Gil’s name on the injury report...Cincy will be facing a solid, talented Revs team regardless of who starts.”
Young homegrown Esmir Bajraktarevic stepped in for Borrero and the Revs’ rhythm section barely missed a beat. Then again, that turned mostly played out to in the big-picture response. Things didn’t look so hot for the Revs in the near-term. And that “solid, talented team” theory could have looked different, maybe even should have.
To finally turn to FC Cincinnati – i.e., the actual subject of the post – they didn’t waste much time in putting that that theory to the test. Taking any kind of lead would do and Rennicks looked to have handed them one when he tagged a ball Alvaro Barreal clipped past him into the area with his right hand. I didn’t like the call – while there was no question Rennicks tagged the ball with his hand, I never got an angle that confirmed he did it in the “no-no zone” (can we make that happen, guys?) – but referee Alex Chilowicz pointed to the penalty spot...which happened to be the very same one from which Luciano Acosta got stuffed by the Revs’ Dorde Petrovic (how is this not a highlight, MLS?). For what it’s worth, I’m reading the miss as God seconding my doubts on the penalty call...
Cincinnati had dropped a couple stones’ worth of pressure on New England to that point – I thought Brandon Vazquez had pinged one off a post somewhere in there (the highlights memory-holed that one too, if he did) – and the corner that followed in less than a minute after the missed PK followed when they dropped on another one. The cross looked innocuous enough when it floated in, but Yerson Mosquera made a masterpiece of it when he slipped away from Andrew Farrell (a rock all afternoon; one of MLS’ best emergency defenders, still doing it) and into Dave Romney’s (also strong yesterday) blind-spot; ah, Mosquera’s li’l, legal bump into Romney’s back, the masterstroke. Once Cincinnati scored the opener, the test was on.
“...unless Cincy fans see Gil’s name on the injury report...Cincy will be facing a solid, talented Revs team regardless of who starts.”
Young homegrown Esmir Bajraktarevic stepped in for Borrero and the Revs’ rhythm section barely missed a beat. Then again, that turned mostly played out to in the big-picture response. Things didn’t look so hot for the Revs in the near-term. And that “solid, talented team” theory could have looked different, maybe even should have.
To finally turn to FC Cincinnati – i.e., the actual subject of the post – they didn’t waste much time in putting that that theory to the test. Taking any kind of lead would do and Rennicks looked to have handed them one when he tagged a ball Alvaro Barreal clipped past him into the area with his right hand. I didn’t like the call – while there was no question Rennicks tagged the ball with his hand, I never got an angle that confirmed he did it in the “no-no zone” (can we make that happen, guys?) – but referee Alex Chilowicz pointed to the penalty spot...which happened to be the very same one from which Luciano Acosta got stuffed by the Revs’ Dorde Petrovic (how is this not a highlight, MLS?). For what it’s worth, I’m reading the miss as God seconding my doubts on the penalty call...
Cincinnati had dropped a couple stones’ worth of pressure on New England to that point – I thought Brandon Vazquez had pinged one off a post somewhere in there (the highlights memory-holed that one too, if he did) – and the corner that followed in less than a minute after the missed PK followed when they dropped on another one. The cross looked innocuous enough when it floated in, but Yerson Mosquera made a masterpiece of it when he slipped away from Andrew Farrell (a rock all afternoon; one of MLS’ best emergency defenders, still doing it) and into Dave Romney’s (also strong yesterday) blind-spot; ah, Mosquera’s li’l, legal bump into Romney’s back, the masterstroke. Once Cincinnati scored the opener, the test was on.
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| A second act in movie form, really. |
A smart, entertaining game unfolded from there. As a certified central midfield geek, I had a fucking ball watching Cincinnati’s Obinna Nwobodo and Jesus Moreno trade blows with New England’s Matt Polster and Noel Buck; one outstanding sequence saw Nwobodo (literally) run down Buck only to have Polster come across and poke the ball off Nwobodo’s foot. (Just to note it, Buck plays like he’s 27; the kid’s got it.) Carles Gil running around like a protagonist toward the end of the second act speaks to how quickly useful spaces collapsed out there, but then the player I least expected – e.g., the one I implied gave Cincy an advantage in that same preview – stepped forward with the solution for the Revs and an answer for Cincinnati’s hypothesis.
With Gil ranging all over, Bye just kept working Cincy’s left flank – specifically, the space between Barreal and Mosquera – and, lo, he found it fruitful again and again toward the end of the first half. Better for the Revs (and worse for Cincy) he had a counterpart on the opposite side, a yin to his yang, in the ageless, inexhaustible Emmaneul Boateng. And, in the telling moment, Bye skipped past Mosquera’s lunge and into the wider spaces where he whipped a ball across the face of goal for Boateng to slam home at the back post. To return to the theme that started this post, the guy who played the ball in to Bye’s run was no other than Bajraktarevic.
All that said, few experiments come off without a hitch and I’d like to point to a glitch in the data. Chilowicz screwed Cincinnati out of what looked like a clear penalty call to me around the 64th minute (that made the recap; look toward the end). It started when an overcooked, looping cross fell to Acosta at the back-post and ended when Farrell lunged for the ball as he stepped to the endline. Farrell definitely made contact, and with Acosta exclusively, not the ball. Chilowicz made the right call in real time, but then somehow got bewitched by the goddamn monitor...again, VAR is a fucking lie, people, a false god that should be cast into the pits of Tartarus.
With Gil ranging all over, Bye just kept working Cincy’s left flank – specifically, the space between Barreal and Mosquera – and, lo, he found it fruitful again and again toward the end of the first half. Better for the Revs (and worse for Cincy) he had a counterpart on the opposite side, a yin to his yang, in the ageless, inexhaustible Emmaneul Boateng. And, in the telling moment, Bye skipped past Mosquera’s lunge and into the wider spaces where he whipped a ball across the face of goal for Boateng to slam home at the back post. To return to the theme that started this post, the guy who played the ball in to Bye’s run was no other than Bajraktarevic.
All that said, few experiments come off without a hitch and I’d like to point to a glitch in the data. Chilowicz screwed Cincinnati out of what looked like a clear penalty call to me around the 64th minute (that made the recap; look toward the end). It started when an overcooked, looping cross fell to Acosta at the back-post and ended when Farrell lunged for the ball as he stepped to the endline. Farrell definitely made contact, and with Acosta exclusively, not the ball. Chilowicz made the right call in real time, but then somehow got bewitched by the goddamn monitor...again, VAR is a fucking lie, people, a false god that should be cast into the pits of Tartarus.
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| New England: a Visual |
I laced as many notes on New England as I did on Cincy into the thoughts above for the simple reason that they clearly present as an obstacle standing between Cincinnati and some kind of silverware. Case in point, there they are right now, one place above Cincy in the Eastern Conference standings and one point ahead of the Seattle Sounders in the race to the Supporters’ Shield.
And yet that doesn’t erase the fact of the result – Cincinnati drew that very good team and at their place – or the argument that they a great chance to win it, but for Chilowicz staring into that damn lying monitor. These are the kinds of games good teams drop and Cincinnati barely dropped it. Moreover, they continues to answer the question, can they do it without Brenner in a confident affirmative. Cincinnati didn’t create a ton of chances (see here), but they created good ones (see same place and scroll down) – e.g., Acosta slipping a perfect pass to Sergio Santos in the heart of the area, plus two more chances late, one for Acosta (again, Romney had a good game) and a half-open header for Nick Hagglund as the game breathed its last.
Missing the banter during FC Cincinnati games has been the price I’ve paid for the Apple TV package. As much as I value it, the schedule routinely forces me to choose between watching Cincinnati and my Portland Timbers, which amounts to a "so long" to the live experience. That means missing how Cincy fans are reacting to the results or game-play in real time. As such, I don’t have a great sense for how disappointed your average Cincy fan feels about this result, or whether he or she feels disappointment at all. If I had to distill all the above into an argument, I’d call it a case that they shouldn’t. That said, one caveat...and this applies to the biggest of pictures in 2023.
New England’s depth has been sounded in the early days of the 2023 season – which is to say, Bruce Arena ain’t wrong when he says the Revs’ homegrowns have been “outstanding.” I’m not sure the same can be said for Cincinnati’s and, if I have a worry at all about their 2023, that’s the big one. I don’t mean that in absolute terms – for instance, I suspect Gil going down would hurt New England’s odds just as much as Acosta going down for Cincinnati – but I feel like they’ve got more padding over the rest of the field than Cincy does in theirs. And you’re welcome for the nagging worry.
Till the next one...
And yet that doesn’t erase the fact of the result – Cincinnati drew that very good team and at their place – or the argument that they a great chance to win it, but for Chilowicz staring into that damn lying monitor. These are the kinds of games good teams drop and Cincinnati barely dropped it. Moreover, they continues to answer the question, can they do it without Brenner in a confident affirmative. Cincinnati didn’t create a ton of chances (see here), but they created good ones (see same place and scroll down) – e.g., Acosta slipping a perfect pass to Sergio Santos in the heart of the area, plus two more chances late, one for Acosta (again, Romney had a good game) and a half-open header for Nick Hagglund as the game breathed its last.
Missing the banter during FC Cincinnati games has been the price I’ve paid for the Apple TV package. As much as I value it, the schedule routinely forces me to choose between watching Cincinnati and my Portland Timbers, which amounts to a "so long" to the live experience. That means missing how Cincy fans are reacting to the results or game-play in real time. As such, I don’t have a great sense for how disappointed your average Cincy fan feels about this result, or whether he or she feels disappointment at all. If I had to distill all the above into an argument, I’d call it a case that they shouldn’t. That said, one caveat...and this applies to the biggest of pictures in 2023.
New England’s depth has been sounded in the early days of the 2023 season – which is to say, Bruce Arena ain’t wrong when he says the Revs’ homegrowns have been “outstanding.” I’m not sure the same can be said for Cincinnati’s and, if I have a worry at all about their 2023, that’s the big one. I don’t mean that in absolute terms – for instance, I suspect Gil going down would hurt New England’s odds just as much as Acosta going down for Cincinnati – but I feel like they’ve got more padding over the rest of the field than Cincy does in theirs. And you’re welcome for the nagging worry.
Till the next one...
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