Stumptown Footy - Portland Thorns at North Carolina Courage: Coverage HubYou are my sunshine, my only sunshine.https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/community_logos/31537/stumptown-fave.jpg2018-08-09T16:13:55-07:00http://www.stumptownfooty.com/rss/stream/174132572018-08-09T16:13:55-07:002018-08-09T16:13:55-07:00Roses and Thorns: Win some, lose some
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<p id="B6mw6F">This was always going to be a hard week.</p>
<p id="QLUAVq">The Thorns were far from perfect against North Carolina. They made mistakes that they explicitly headed into the game wanting to avoid. But the necessary perspective is that this Courage side is without a doubt the most dominant team in the history of the NWSL — and possibly in the history of women’s professional soccer in the United States. In that sense, and several others, this game isn’t without positives — in short, it’s the perfect fit for this column! Let’s break it down.</p>
<p id="LROcgR"><strong>A rose to the game plan.</strong></p>
<p id="kti4KL">Portland’s approach was, in a sense, the opposite of what Utah tried against North Carolina in June. Where Laura Harvey had her team pressure the Courage on the wings but sit back in the center of the pitch, the Thorns pushed their opponents out to the wings, where they let Merritt Mathias and <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/277498/jaelene-hinkle">Jaelene Hinkle </a>— as well as Jessica McDonald, <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/277497/lynn-williams">Lynn Williams</a>, Denise O’Sullivan, and whoever else wanted to get in on the party — have space.</p>
<p id="zz5IXF">That plan worked over and over, especially since the Courage were channeling almost every attack up the right. The reasoning makes sense from both angles: <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/255543/meghan-klingenberg">Meghan Klingenberg</a> is not very fast, while Mathias is not a very good crosser, so the way to approach that matchup is to have Kling drop and encourage Mathias to send hopeful balls in from deep. It was only when a Courage player went endline that Kling, Menges, or whoever else would step to try to keep them from crossing. You can see it on this 13th-minute transition play. <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/293432/tobin-heath">Tobin Heath</a> keeps Mathias wide, Kling gives her space on North Carolina’s right, and sure enough, she sends in a cross 30 yards out from the endline.</p>
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<p id="8cAwNh">Williams wound up getting on the end of this, but with Midge Purce marking her, she was only able to head it out for a goal kick.</p>
<p id="w4NbgR">They did it on the other side, too. Here are Purce and Celeste Boureille giving Hinkle as much space as she wants on the left, to encourage her to cross from deep.</p>
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<p id="ZOgbfq">This one fell into space to the right of the penalty area, where Williams tracked it down and couldn’t get past Emily Menges with either a dribble or a decent cross.</p>
<p id="5Z2LFg">The Courage are <em>always</em> going to take a ton of shots. What this strategy meant was that they were spending most of their time on poor-quality chances that the Thorns defense was confident they could deal with. It worked, until it didn’t.</p>
<p id="CiCtVm"><strong>A thorn for not sticking to the game plan.</strong></p>
<p id="kSNSIX">In the 37th minute, this idea broke down. After what was probably Portland’s best chance of the half — with Boureille playing a nice ball over the top for an onrushing Heath, and Heath just getting her cross to <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/293437/hayley-raso">Hayley Raso</a> off in time — the Courage regained possession and sent a ball down the right for McDonald.</p>
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<p id="cAEz5r">I’m not sure why Kling cuts inside here, or why Menges doesn’t step with more urgency; the area McDonald is sprinting into is exactly where the Thorns <em>don’t</em> want to allow the Courage to cross from.</p>
<p id="oj029E">If that first goal might be excusable in part because of McDonald’s speed, North Carolina’s second was worse, with Heath giving Mathias time and room to cross from that same space on the right of the penalty area. Granted, it didn’t end up being a good cross, and Menges should have cleared it, but she also shouldn’t have been allowed to cross in the first place.</p>
<p id="3th4wf"><strong>A thorn to the Courage, in general.</strong></p>
<p id="TESJnx">Needless to say, those mistakes shouldn’t happen. At the same time, it really can’t be overstated how dominant this Courage team is. A big part of that is basically just physics: I don’t know that there’s a single player in their starting lineup who couldn’t beat, or at least tie, any Thorns player in a sprint. That speed means they can commit just about any number of players to any area of the field at a given time without having to worry about a numerical disadvantage elsewhere, because they can recover absurdly fast.</p>
<p id="27WHx0">In the seventh minute, after a North Carolina corner kick got cleared, Heath poached a careless pass in the center of the field and did a nice give-and-go with Raso. That’s <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/277500/abby-dahlkemper">Abby Dahlkemper</a> in the bottom-right corner. She had just taken the corner kick.</p>
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<p id="EEUDP3">She has no problem closing that distance.</p>
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<p id="R04j08">Heath beats Dahlkemper, but in the amount of time it takes any help to arrive — and granted, maybe you could argue that more Thorns should be crashing the box here — the entirety of the Courage defense is already back.</p>
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<p id="3IWjTv">Tobin Heath and Hayley Raso are <em>not slow! </em></p>
<p id="zKKhoW">To reduce the Courage just to speed is, of course, unfair: It’s not just that they’re fast, but the way they deploy that speed, and what it allows them to do, is what makes them so overwhelming. You didn’t come here to read an essay about how North Carolina plays, so I’m not going to get into that. Instead, I’ll just point out that any time a team plays the Courage, they’re going to be spending most of their time time absorbing attacks. It may be disappointing when they slip up enough to let a couple of those attacks succeed, but it should never be all that surprising. At some point, it’s just a numbers game.</p>
<p id="SrHvA0"><strong>A rose to Caitlin Foord.</strong></p>
<p id="LHQFug">Y’all. Caitlin Foord is the real deal.</p>
<p id="hU8tli">Immediately after subbing on in the second half, Foord sprinted onto a clearance after a Courage corner kick, beat Mathias with a clever touch and a burst of speed, beat her again after she recovered, and then sent a long ball up for Raso. That service wasn’t great, falling too close to Abby Dahlkemper, but the sequence is an encapsulation of what Foord brings to the table: impressive speed paired with skill on the ball and good vision. In the half-hour she played, she combined with Heath, Horan, and Sinclair a number of times despite never having played a game with them. She played well with her back to goal and had a couple looks of her own.</p>
<p id="25JEGw">It was just a glimpse of what Foord can do, but it’s hard not to wonder how different this season could have felt for the Thorns if she hadn’t started it injured.</p>
https://www.stumptownfooty.com/2018/8/9/17668936/roses-and-thorns-win-some-lose-someKatelyn Best2018-08-09T15:12:10-07:002018-08-09T15:12:10-07:00Thorns FC: Boss Fight
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<p>The Thorns are stumped again in North Carolina</p> <p id="GjQ2au">At the end of the “NWSL Regular Season” level, which ever team wants to move on to the <em>next</em> level - “NWSL Championship” - is going to have to beat the <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/teams/carolina-courage">North Carolina Courage</a>. </p>
<p id="bF33K4">From Wikipedia:</p>
<blockquote><p id="gPLCgX">“A fight with a boss character is commonly referred to as a <strong>boss battle</strong> or <strong>boss fight</strong>. (T)he boss enemy is generally far stronger than the opponents the player has faced up to that point. At times, bosses are very hard, even impossible to defeat without being adequately prepared and/or knowing the correct fighting approach. Bosses take strategy and special knowledge to defeat, such as how to attack weak points or avoiding specific attacks.” </p></blockquote>
<p id="wEYIz5">Based on <a href="http://www.nwslsoccer.com/game/north-carolina-courage-vs-portland-thorns-2018-08-05">last Sunday’s match</a> the Portland Thorns are not now adequately prepared, and do not yet know the correct approach, to win this boss fight. </p>
<p id="ZN0mcu">The Utah Royals are the only team in the NWSL that has figured out North Carolina, beating them once and drawing them twice. The Thorns have beaten Utah twice and drawn them once. But, for some reason I can’t figure out, Portland can’t square the circle - they can’t beat <em>or</em> draw North Carolina and haven’t really come close in three tries.</p>
<p id="pg4lSB">What’s maddening about this is that you know what the Courage will throw at you; relentless pressure, speed across the full width of the pitch, and a crap-ton of shots, many of them poor quality. </p>
<p id="4tXx80">Last weekend was no different, and even knowing what was coming, Portland didn’t seem to have an answer for that. </p>
<p id="k4e0ww">North Carolina would come tearing upfield full gas, and the Thorns would just seem to start randomly running, leaving North Carolina eons of time and acres of space to pick them apart.</p>
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<cite>Image by Lifetime/NWSL. Licensed under Fair Use.</cite>
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<p id="jVhK90">Look at the opportunities for Merritt Mathias. A run straight up the right channel. A diagonal pass up to McCall Zerboni that Celeste Boureille is in no position to cut off. A long, looping cross-field switch over to <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/277497/lynn-williams">Lynn Williams</a> who has got open, well wide of Midge Purce. </p>
<p id="dwGjjP">And, despite being packed together like sardines in a tin, the Portland backline has still left a gap open for Jessica McDonald to run through.</p>
<p id="N4NkHV">Here’s another example, from just over a minute later.</p>
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<cite>Image by Lifetime/NWSL. Licensed under Fair Use.</cite>
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<p id="hkZVm0">This Courage attack starts when Debinha settles a lofted clearance out of North Carolina’s defensive third. Notice that she’s already behind <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/293438/christine-sinclair">Christine Sinclair</a> and <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/293434/lindsey-horan">Lindsey Horan</a>, who were forced to push up high all match to try and attack or provide service to Portland’s forwards.</p>
<p id="z8hheD">Also note Portland’s back four locked tightly together in the center of the pitch, ceding the wide areas to North Carolina. I’m guessing that Coach Parsons was worried about defending runs through the middle, but if this was the response it wasn’t working.</p>
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<cite>Image by Lifetime/NWSL. Licensed under Fair Use.</cite>
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<p id="xTKLfO">Debinha passes across the field to Zerboni while continuing her forward run. Williams gets wide of Purce, and McDonald and Denise O’Sullivan push up against the retreating Portland backline.</p>
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<cite>Image by Lifetime/NWSL. Licensed under Fair Use.</cite>
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<p id="lkEayO">Even though they have to know what’s coming, there are too many possible options to let the Portland defense get tight on Williams to intercept or force her off the lead pass. </p>
<p id="NSpGSZ">Worse, Zerboni’s pass takes Boureille out of the picture, putting her well behind the play. The Courage now have four attackers running at five defenders, if you include Horan. McDonald is sneaking in behind Emily Menges and <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/255543/meghan-klingenberg">Meghan Klingenberg</a>, who are too busy ball-watching to head-check her. O’Sullivan is getting into a dangerous position behind Horan, who is overtasked.</p>
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<cite>Image by Lifetime/NWSL. Licensed under Fair Use.</cite>
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<p id="4P8vsP">As Williams reaches the top corner of the Thorns’ penalty area she’s still got a lot of options;</p>
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<li id="js6m81">Drop a short square pass to Debinha running into the top of the penalty arch. The Brazilian is in space equidistant from Purce, Horan, and Menges,</li>
<li id="tfJG0x">Hit a longer square pass to McDonald (though Purce and Menges aren’t too badly placed to cut that option off, making it a lower quality play) or,</li>
<li id="L4k26z">Pass all the way across the field to Denise O’Sullivan; either a low hard pass across the top of the penalty area into O’Sullivan’s path, or a longer, aerial cross for O’Sullivan to run under. </li>
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<p id="CRFmKW">Fortunately for Portland, Williams squares to Debinha and underhits the pass, forcing her teammate to slow up and allowing Horan to catch Debinha, tangle her up, and eventually dispossess her.</p>
<p id="rVzk6I">Keep in mind <em>this was within the first quarter hour</em>. Portland’s legs were fresh, the Thorns’ defense as alert and composed as it would be all match. Even so, North Carolina’s speed and passing sliced Portland’s defense open and continued to do that most of the game. </p>
<p id="5tqP0m">Here’s InStat’s summary of the dangerous Courage attacks <em>just</em> from the run of play.</p>
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<cite>Image by InStat. Used by permission.</cite>
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<p id="Tpi2Kl">This was the teams’ third meeting this season. Given the hidings they received in the first two, Coach Parsons and the Thorns <em>must</em> have had a plan to try and stop North Carolina. </p>
<p id="F5p4Ng">If they did, however, it didn’t work any better than the first two times the teams met. North Carolina bossed Portland around for most of the game like, well, a boss. While I wouldn’t say North Carolina ran Portland off the pitch, the Thorns never looked likely to do any better than scratch out an equalizer. The Courage controlled the pace and shape of the match.</p>
<p id="Bs1KmO">This season, Portland has struggled to recreate 2017’s defensive cohesion and attacking creativity. North Carolina, by contrast, has developed into the best team in the NWSL with a swarming attack, aggressive forechecking defense, and a tenacious midfield that helps shield their somewhat slow-footed backline.</p>
<p id="WTHCAo">I have little doubt that with hard work and some good fortune Portland can scramble into the 2018 playoffs. But - barring a miracle - all that will do is force the Thorns to try <em>again</em> to beat North Carolina some time in September.</p>
<p id="77eQBj">Portland was the boss of 2016, and Paul Riley’s Western New York Flash got smarter and more dangerous each time they met Portland in the regular season, until in the semifinal they figured out that to beat the Thorns you just had to beat <em>up</em> on them. They did, and it worked.</p>
<p id="HB9xUA">Mark Parsons’ Thorns have had three shots at this year’s boss and look no closer to figuring them out than they did back in March.</p>
<p id="YE06QJ">So there it is, Thorns.</p>
<p id="fEa7jn">Riley figured you out in three matches two years ago.</p>
<p id="JkiyFx">You now have just about six weeks, and just one more match, to return the disfavor.</p>
<p id="WQrvfo">Let’s do that.</p>
<h3 id="UtoGtu">Player Ratings and Comments</h3>
<p id="CjA94c"><strong>Crnogorcevic</strong> (<em>58’ -</em> +2/-6 : +1/-1 : +3/-7) <em>Die Schweitzerin’s</em> first half rating is pulled way down by her passing, which was atrocious - every single minus was a pass that went right to a blue shirt. Other than that, Crnogorcevic was just stranded, unable to get service from Portland’s overrun midfield, and forced to race back every time North Carolina tore off upfield.</p>
<p id="hBH1Jp">I’m reading suggestions that Portland should try to play long balls against North Carolina. I think the combination of the Courage’s defensive strengths and Portland’s forwards playing styles make that tactic unlikely to succeed. Raso works best when running at defenders and AMC has become a sort of poacher, mixing it up in a helter-skelter penalty area and picking up loose balls. Going Route 1 and bombing long balls into the heart of the Courage defense simply lets the Abbys (Dahlkemper and Erceg) minimize their weakness - lack of pace - and accentuate their strengths; tight marking and tough tackling.</p>
<p id="Wi9BtX"><strong>Raso</strong> (<em>78’ -</em> +4/-1 : +2/-0 : +6/-1) <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/293437/hayley-raso">Hayley Raso</a> had the same problems Crnogorcevic did; she couldn’t get the ball, and when she did it was usually in a muddle of bodies from which she couldn’t get a clean strike. She did have a good run in the 48th minute, but her cross went to nobody because nobody was there to receive it. Most of her pluses are defensive, which gives you an idea of the sort of night Raso had.</p>
<p id="cYxaQj">Raso may have suffered from Tournament of Nations exhaustion. In the 72nd minute Sinclair hit a pretty lead pass down the right touchline, the sort of pacey through-ball that Raso usually feasts on. Raso was so lead-footed that she couldn’t even get <em>close</em> to it before Debinha strolled over and cleaned it away. That she came off just minutes later makes me suspect she was gassed by some time around the hour mark, which is a very un-Raso thing.</p>
<p id="hbTjZ8"><strong>Foord</strong> (<em>32’ -</em> +3/-2) By the time she came on, Portland had been run ragged, so Caitlin Foord didn’t get much opportunity to show attacking flair. She did have some nice runs, winning a corner in the 63rd minute, and getting open to fire a hard shot at Katelyn Rowland in the 71st. She also showed the rust of her long layoff, misplaying a pass to Heath that killed off a promising attack in the 75th minute and then running into traffic and getting tackled for loss in the 86th. We’ll need to see more of her to find out whether she’s as good as advertised.</p>
<p id="HLgiek"><strong>Heath</strong> (+9/-4 : +5/-3 : +14/-7) If I was handing out a Woman of the Match for this one (and the taste is still so sour that it’s hard to do that) I’d give it to <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/293432/tobin-heath">Tobin Heath</a> for never giving up. Heath continued creating, probing at North Carolina’s defense, and just being a nuisance to the Courage from kickoff until the final whistle. </p>
<p id="5fF5ns">She did show her usual tendency to dribble into trouble - 5 of her 7 minuses are for being tackled for loss - but that was more forgivable on an evening when the Thorns weren’t creating much otherwise. Tough match, working hard for a losing effort. InStat agrees with me; Heath’s Index of 191 is second best on the team behind Horan’s 203.</p>
<p id="y3nQlO"><strong>Sinclair </strong>(+3/-4 : +3/-0 : +6/-4) By her own standards, a shockingly poor evening for Captain Sinclair. Sinc lost 10 of her 17 individual challenges, succeeded in only slightly more than 60% of her attacking moves, and completed only 71% of her passes. </p>
<p id="H8SkLS">Worse, for Portland, Sinc was just not able to impact the match. In attack, she couldn’t connect with her passes and didn’t get a good look at goal. In defense, North Carolina ran around her like a practice cone. Sinc needs to shrug this one off and move on.</p>
<p id="ARU8s2"><strong>Boureille</strong> (+5/-5 : +5/-6 : +10/-11) Celeste Boureille had a hell of an assignment last weekend. With Horan, Heath, and Sinclair pushing up she had to try and lock down the back of the midfield with North Carolina running wild at her. I can’t even imagine what that was like - it must have looked like a junior high school recess. Boureille did decently overall but not surprisingly she was also over- and outrun repeatedly.</p>
<p id="XFb8Vo"><strong>Horan</strong> (+3/-4 : +5/-4 : +8/-8) Lindsey Horan scored Portland’s only goal in the midst of having what may have been her most marginal, random play all season, alternating her usual creative play with losing possession and misplaying passes. I said above that her InStat Index was the Thorns’ best for this match, but it’s worth noting that her typical numbers for a good game are up in the mid-200s. I was even harder on her; her net PMR zero is the lowest of 2018.</p>
<p id="LwZFkn">Given how she has carried Portland’s attack much of Portland’s sterility can be traced to Horan not connecting with her passes or succeeding in her attacks, and then having to race back as North Carolina poured forward. Horan and Sinclair were marginalized in this match, and it showed.</p>
<p id="GpmRHv"><strong>Andressinha</strong> (<em>17’ -</em> +3/-1) Not awful, but mostly uninvolved and largely ineffective when she wasn’t. InStat agrees; her Index of 129 is the match “winner” of the <em>Balon d’Nope</em>.</p>
<p id="kkAod8"><strong>Purce</strong> (<em>70 -</em> +5/-3 : +1/-3 : +6/-6) Tired in the second half so her relief was timely, but the bottom line is that even while fresh Purce had no answer for Williams’ speed, no other Thorn did, either, so no shame to Purce who had a decent shift. For a player coming off a severe injury, Purce did as well as she could; unfortunately Portland needed more.</p>
<p id="t0cMGd"><strong>Sonnett</strong> (+2/-8 : +2/-3 : +4/-11) Desperately lucky not to have conceded a penalty in the 30th minute she she took down McDonald with her backside.</p>
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<cite>Image by Lifetime/NWSL. Licensed under Fair Use.</cite>
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<p id="I8hOsu">Other than that, Sonnet may have had her worst match of the season; her net PMR and her Index of 138 are her lowest to date. Certainly she played as badly as I’ve seen her play with Emily Menges alongside her. We can only hope that she was suffering from too much international play and that a week of rest will help her recover her usual form.</p>
<p id="rpozSn"><strong>Menges</strong> (+1/-7 : +4/-0 : +5/-7) Emily Menges had a better second half, but her first half was bad enough to help put the Thorns in a hole they couldn’t climb out of, and unlike her partner Emily she can’t blame the Tournament of Nations. Only won 64% of her individual challenges; the fact that she did the best of the Thorns back line is a harsh comment on that group. Did lead the Thorns in ball recoveries with 11. For another center back the last match might have been just a kinda tough night at the office. For a player of Menges’ quality it was a <em>very</em> poor outing.</p>
<p id="MuCJRL"><strong>Klingenberg</strong> (+5/-10 : +4/-5 : +10/-15) Although she won 57% of her individual battles, Meghan Klingenberg was repeatedly skinned to the outside by Courage attackers; Debinha in the 21st minute, O’Sullivan in the 29th (who also megged her brutally), and Williams in the 59th. Typically Kling makes up for her lack of defensive pace with attacking service, but against North Carolina she connected with only 62% of her passes. With the Courage attacking from the flanks, Kling was sure to be tested, and her relative slowness meant that Klingenberg had a tough time meeting the challenge.</p>
<p id="ckh8gE"><strong>Ball</strong> (<em>20’ -</em> +4/-4) While her appearance was likely forced by Purce’s limited minutes rather than prompted by her own qualities, Elizabeth Ball did well enough in her third of an hour. Another decent performance from a player who looks like she should probably get more minutes.</p>
<p id="37ONO7"><strong>Franch</strong> (+4/-0 : +4/-1 : +8/-1) Not at fault on the first concession, and probably couldn’t have done much better on the second. Franch kept Portland in the match to the extent they were, including a fine save of Zerboni’s snap header in the 41st minute and of an <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/285630/abby-erceg">Abby Erceg</a> header in the 70th. Spilled a hard <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/players/277499/samantha-mewis">Samantha Mewis</a> shot in the 66th minute that she probably should have held, but Williams missed off the rebound, so Franch escaped the danger.</p>
<p id="cwjvPB"><strong>Coach Parsons -</strong> Two of his substitutions seemed as much forced by circumstances as attempts to reshape the match; Raso was toast by the 70th minute, and Purce’s minutes were probably limited by her rehabilitation. Foord brought some energy into the late minutes of the match but wasn’t able to solve the problem Portland faced retaining possession and creating attack.</p>
<p id="NA50ra">Parsons’s challenge is defined by Riley’s success in 2016. Riley looked at the Thorns as a problem to solve, and he came up with a solution as the season progressed. That solution was ugly, but it worked. The problem of North Carolina is now Parsons’s problem to solve, and if he can solve it the Thorns have a chance to win the boss fight. To defend the championship, he and they will <em>have</em> to, eventually.</p>
<p id="HFF2d2">But the first order of business is getting into that fight, which means Portland has to shake off this loss and go to Orlando and get a result. With the form Orlando has displayed lately, I have no idea whether, or how, that can happen.</p>
<p id="m5M83d">I just know that it needs to happen.</p>
<p id="7IiMLz"></p>
https://www.stumptownfooty.com/2018/8/9/17663206/thorns-fc-boss-fightJohn Lawes2018-08-03T12:00:01-07:002018-08-03T12:00:01-07:00Storylines: Portland Thorns at North Carolina Courage
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<p id="kp9exW">After a week off for the Tournament of Nations, the Thorns are back on the road this Sunday for their third and final game against the North Carolina Courage. With a win and some unlikely help from the Washington Spirit in their game against Seattle, Portland could jump into second place. Lose, and the Thorns probably get leapfrogged by Orlando, who play Sky Blue later the same evening. Can Portland steal one or three points against their powerhouse rivals, or will the Courage sweep the series?</p>
<h2 id="dkm1E6">Starting XI</h2>
<p id="AgHPIj">Both Portland and North Carolina sent a lot of players to the Tournament of Nations. On the Thorns’ side, Lindsey Horan, Tobin Heath, Emily Sonnett, and AD Franch all missed the Sky Blue game for USWNT training; Andressinha, Hayley Raso, Ellie Carpenter, and Caitlin Foord reported to their respective national teams after that match. Of those players, Horan, Heath, Sonnett, Andressinha, Raso, and Carpenter have all seen significant playing time, while Franch hasn’t played and Foord has only subbed on late for Australia. All the American field players, plus Andressinha and Carpenter, will probably start Thursday — Raso may start, or may be on the bench in favor of Kyah Simon.</p>
<p id="WDVwG5">What all that means for the Thorns is that they’ll have to be judicious with their subs on Sunday. Sonnett will probably be fine to play 90 minutes at center back, but Heath, Raso, Andressinha, and maybe Carpenter likely don’t have a full game in them. Whether Horan plays the whole match may depend as much on how the game is going as on how much mileage she’ll have racked up over the tournament.</p>
<p id="ZauSB9">Obviously, this isn’t ideal, but there are several things that work in Portland’s favor here. The first is that the Thorns’ best central midfield setup doesn’t include both Horan and Andressinha anyway. It’s not hard to envision Parsons starting Horan, Christine Sinclair, and Boureille in the midfield, subbing Horan off for Andressinha at halftime or around the 60-minute mark, and slotting the Brazilian in at the number ten while Sinclair moves to the eight. </p>
<p id="kLXVvw">The other, even more fortuitous factor, is that Foord is getting very limited minutes with Australia as she works her way back from injury. Being able to bring her on for Raso in the second half, perhaps shifting Ana Crnogorcevic to the right wing, has to be seen as a major luxury; she should inject energy and pace into the game at a time when a lot of starters on both sides might be starting to slow down.</p>
<p id="HIdmNy">So, with all that said, I expect Parsons to start what’s become his first choice XI in recent weeks.</p>
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<p id="leOR18">In text format: AD Franch in goal, Meghan Klingenberg, Emily Menges, Emily Sonnett, and Ellie Carpenter in the back; Lindsey Horan, Celeste Boureille, and Christine Sinclair in the midfield; Tobin Heath and Hayley Raso on the wings; and Ana Crnogorcevic up top.</p>
<h2 id="GLCQiH">Scouting the opposition</h2>
<p id="C33kz5">Like the Thorns, North Carolina will go into this game with many of their starters having just returned from the Tournament of Nations, but collectively, their internationals got fewer minutes than Portland’s did. Abby Dahlkemper, Crystal Dunn, and Debinha all had significant playing time, with Dahlkemper and Dunn<strong> </strong>both playing 90 or close to it in all three USA games. The other Americans at the tournament—Sam Mewis, McCall Zerboni, and Merritt Mathias—saw varying minutes, with only Mathias getting none.</p>
<p id="dsWPWP">The Courage players who didn’t go to the Tournament of Nations <em>did </em>play in the World’s Most Prestigious Tournament, the inaugural women’s International Champions Cup. That means they’ve played two games in a two-week period where the Thorns didn’t play at all. On the other hand, North Carolina goes into this with the confidence of having just beaten the best team in the world (lol).</p>
<p id="hxYvbi">Regardless, tired legs or not, the Courage are ridiculously good. As I’ve written before, there’s almost no way this team can’t hurt an opponent. With McCall Zerboni and Sam Mewis dictating the tempo in the center of the pitch, Merritt Mathias and Jaelene “700 Club” Hinkle both bombing up the wings from the back line, and Crystal Dunn and Debinha roaming between opponents’ lines and causing havoc, it hasn’t even mattered that North Carolina’s shooting accuracy has been comically bad at times. When you’re putting up 20 or 25 shots a game, a few of them are almost bound to go in.</p>
<p id="Cy0eMb">In the back, North Carolina is extremely well-organized, with a league-best defensive record to match their league-best offense—they’ve conceded 14 and scored 41 for a goal differential of 27. You read that right: twenty f***ing seven. The Thorns have the second-best GD, a pitiful-by-comparison seven.</p>
<p id="EQpnN5">In short: hang onto your butts, everyone.</p>
<h2 id="nYuKpL">Gameplan</h2>
<p id="p3ndau">With all that said, North Carolina <em>is </em>beatable. One team, the Utah Royals, have done it; Utah has the best record against the Courage of any team this season, with two draws and a win.</p>
<p id="ILO0B1">That win came on a beautiful stoppage-time goal by Brittany Ratcliffe, where a Utah free kick fell to Hinkle, and Ratcliffe stripped the ball, turned, and shot from the top of the 18. What’s more instructive, though, is how the Royals were able to hold North Carolina scoreless to that point.</p>
<p id="ouHbEi">Anytime the Courage tried to go through Hinkle or Mathias on the wings, Katrina Gorry or Diana Matheson would step and pressure them to either cut inside or pass back. When Mewis or Zerboni were on the ball in the center, though, Utah would sit back and force them to play through traffic rather than pressing to try and get a turnover. Thinking about how strong on the ball those two players are, this strategy makes a lot of sense; neither is likely to turn the ball over, so throwing midfielders into duels with them just tends to create space for them to exploit.</p>
<p id="HdXFqw">North Carolina did still manage to break Utah’s defense down on occasion, but more often, their chances came when Hinkle served a ball in from deep. The Royals limited the home team to 15 shots, which doesn’t sound great, but is less than what they normally put up. Just four of those shots were on target.</p>
<p id="O0I5t6">Of course, this is not how the Thorns like to play. I expect them to press throughout the field the way they typically do, and maybe, with Portland finally able to field what’s close to their best XI, plus some tired legs on the Courage side, that will pay off. What I’m going to be keeping a close eye on is the Thorns’ defense — playing with four instead of three could help them look less exposed, at least if Kling plays a little more conservatively than is her wont. Carpenter on the right is also probably a better match for Hinkle than either Purce or Reynolds, who were at wingback and right center back the last time these two teams met. Finally, the presence of a more dedicated number six in Boureille could be important in keeping some numbers back on any North Carolina breakaways.</p>
<p id="D8xcfT">If Portland defends well for 90 minutes and finds a goal on a transition or a set piece, they <em>could</em> steal this thing — but it’s going to be a difficult test of how far the Thorns have come since May.</p>
https://www.stumptownfooty.com/2018/8/3/17640442/storylines-portland-thorns-at-north-carolina-courageKatelyn Best2018-08-02T15:42:07-07:002018-08-02T15:42:07-07:00Red Smoke Radio: Episode 6, 2018
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<figcaption>Hayley Raso and Marta tangling in their Tournament of Nations matchup. | Photo by Jamie Squire/Getty Images</figcaption>
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<p>The best tournaments in the whole world of soccer.</p> <p id="7N5TAh">Katelyn and Tyler review the international break: the Tournament of Nations and the most prestigious international club tournament, the International Champions Cup. They look ahead to the game against the <a href="http://www.sbnation.com/soccer/NWSL/teams/carolina-courage">North Carolina Courage</a> on the weekend and ask the question: what if the NWSL had an All-Star game?</p>
<div id="0ukdaY"><iframe style="border: none" src="//html5-player.libsyn.com/embed/episode/id/6879803/height/90/theme/custom/autoplay/no/autonext/no/thumbnail/yes/preload/no/no_addthis/no/direction/backward/render-playlist/no/custom-color/87A93A/" height="90" width="100%" scrolling="no" allowfullscreen="" webkitallowfullscreen="" mozallowfullscreen="" oallowfullscreen="" msallowfullscreen=""></iframe></div>
<p id="kSGWiY">Leave your suggestions for skill contests at the (theoretical) NWSL All-Star Game in the comments!</p>
https://www.stumptownfooty.com/2018/8/2/17645092/red-smoke-radio-episode-6-2018-thorns-nwslTyler Nguyen