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| That's...a choice. |
This Saturday, the Portland Timbers take their strong start to the 2024 regular season the home of 2023’s “who did what now?” surprise team, Houston Dynamo FC. I did some scouting, this is my report.
Some Basics
Despite being just two games in their Major League Soccer regular season, CONCACAF Champions’ Le…Cup play has Houston six “real” games deep into the young 2024 season. They have won just one, versus St. Louis CITY FC at home, but they’re stumbling more than they should for a team that has hosted four at home. In their defense, they’ve played good capable, teams in them all, St. Louis and Columbus Crew SC twice, as well as a lively Red Bull New York team once (as for the 6th team…wait for the reveal). Another big picture notable: Houston has scored in every game but one – their CCC Home loss to Columbus last week.
Head coach Ben Olsen has tried a few formations, but it looks like he leans toward a somewhat conservative 4-3-3 (sample); fwiw, I’m not sure what he’ll do against the Timbers, but I’m interested. I hung “conservative” on his line-ups because he builds (most of) his middle threes around Jan Gregus, Artur, and either Coco Carrasqulla or Amine Bassi as the “creative” third. The forward line has (somewhat) consistently involved Ibrahim Aliyu and Sebastian Kowalcyzk, but has had dudes rotate in and out, mostly by absence or circumstance. As for the defense, the primary constants are Steve Clark in goal and young Brazilian Micael (Santos de Silva) in front of him with either Ethan Bartlow or Erik Sviatchenko for a partner. The left fullback and/or left-sided defender has rotated its cast as much as The Love Boat (yay old people!) and, yes, absolutely, there's Griffin Dorsey on the other side...also, hold that thought...
Olsen has this bunch playing a methodical, arguably labored, possession game that sees them play north of 450 passes in every game. I see that The Mothership’s “Availability Report” shows their absences as “To be announced” (because it’s fucking useless and/or may require you to create an account, not unlike the still-absent Form Guide (fuckers!), I'm not paranoid!), but I believe that Hector Herrera remains injured and it looks like they loaned out one-time big-time signing to Sebastian Ferrera, but he never got off paper when it came to entering Houston’s plans for league domination. Oh, and they are wafer-thin at forward, so Herrera starting looks like the only wild card.
