Tag: Thorns

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Soccer Thorns

Takeaways: Thorns 1, Pride 1

Photo by Nikita Taparia

The Thorns extended their unbeaten streak with a hard-fought 1–1 tie against the Orlando Pride yesterday evening, thanks to Simone Charley’s fourth headed goal of the season. The Thorns beat the Pride 2–1 just a few weeks ago, but that was before then-coach Marc Skinner abruptly left for Manchester United. The Pride they played tonight, under interim head coach Becky Burleigh, was more physical and harder to break down, but the Thorns were able to dig deep and find a point on the road. 

At the outset, the Thorns appeared tight and disjointed. Despite only two changes to the starting eleven from the previous week—with Natalia Kuikka getting the start over Christen Westphal and Marissa Everett stepping in for an injured Celeste Boureille—the team struggled to find a rhythm in the early minutes. That was a departure from previous games, where they’ve started on the front foot: the Thorns have scored 11 times in the first 15 minutes this season, a league record.

Last night was a different story: defensively, the Thorns trailed in the first half, winning 43% of their duels. And it was the Pride who found the back of the net early with a header from Jodie Taylor in the 13th minute. The Pride’s initial run of momentum came off of a 4-v-1 battle against Sophia Smith at the top of the 18, where Smith was offered no support or options to get the momentum on Portland’s side.

After the break, though, the Thorns turned things around. In the postgame presser, Charley and Meghan Klingenberg both framed that change as a shift to “Thorns Soccer,” which refers to the core principles that the team follows. Basically, the players hold each other accountable, focus on process over results, and play the same way regardless of who’s on the field. This consistency allows for them build momentum through a game, to where they can score with ease and class.

And that’s what happened: Charley, who is absolutely on fire, recorded her fifth goal of the season off a free kick by Klingenberg that looked straight off of the training ground. Although the goal didn’t come until the 78 minute, the Thorns had been building for a goal throughout the second half. They recorded three shots on target (up from just one in the first half) and only allowed the Pride four shots total, which is much more typical of the Thorns’ dominant, offense-focused style. 

After the game, the players talked about their first-half struggle in finding a rhythm and acting on what the other team was presenting them with. “Somebody is always going to be open, and we need to find that opportunity,” said Kling after the match. She added that once the Thorns are able to find open spaces in game and make adjustments on the fly, they’ll be “scary good.”

Watching that first-to-second-half shift, it’s clear that the Thorns are more than capable of making necessary tactical adjustments and executing plans, and it’s more of a matter of finding the confidence to adjust on the fly, rather than being too shaken to act without having to wait for a break to discuss what to do. 

The Thorns Soccer that Charley and Kling discussed in the post-game conference was also present on an individual level. Parsons cited that nine players were out for this match, but that those absences showed the depth of the team culture, as players went a full 90 and didn’t relent.

With Portland’s five international players still out, many players have gotten more minutes than they did in the first half of the season, but the tactics that they employ don’t change. Angela Salem, who got deservedly high praise from Parsons postgame, had the second-most touches (77) and the most chances created (5), as well as boasting a 78% passing accuracy. She’s a pivotal player in the midfield, acting as the glue to help facilitate movement forward and maintain possession. Against Orlando, Salem was one of the most successful in exploiting the space that the Pride left open and has made an exceptionally strong case to keep her starting spot on the team, as her visions and consistency are emblematic of the Thorns culture that the team has been cultivating all season. 

Another player it’s impossible not to talk about is Olivia Moultrie, who recorded her second professional start against the Pride and played 82 minutes, nearly double what she played last week. And although she recorded the second fewest touches with 39, her work ethic on the field to recover, pressure, and infiltrate the open space opens up the field for her teammates. Especially in the second half, Moultrie played end to end, making several tackles back in her own 18-yard box, showing that she has the mental fortitude to play with the Thorns. 

As the Thorns head into a busy few weeks, with five games in sixteen days thanks to the Women’s International Champions Cup, it’s crucial that they maintain the momentum they have built during the Olympic period. For this team to succeed, every player has to deeply believe in the “Thorns Soccer” culture that allowed them to get back a point on the road against Orlando.

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Soccer Thorns

Takeaways: Thorns 1, Washington Spirit 0

Photo by Kris Lattimore

The Thorns put together a convincing 1–0 win against Washington yesterday to close out the Olympic period seven points clear at the top of the table. Portland earned 16 of a possible 18 points since Christine Sinclair and the USWNT cohort left for Tokyo, only dropping one result in a draw against Gotham.

The game-winner, a sweet header that Simone Charley bounced in off the bottom of the crossbar, was assisted by a gorgeous cross from Olivia Moultrie, who is famously only 15 years old. Moultrie only played 45 minutes—Mark Parsons said after the game that the team is ramping up her minutes gradually—but it was her most impressive outing yet. In contrast to previous games, where many of her minutes have been in garbage time, here she helped set the tone playing a key position in what would turn out to be a calm, competent win.

The Thorns had a numerical advantage in the midfield, with four players there to the Spirit’s three, which Washington tried to neutralize a few ways. First, they were selective about which of the four they left unmarked. Most often this was Angela Salem, the deepest-lying midfielder (though occasionally Rodríguez and Salem would be swapped). Instead of marking her tightly, center forward Ashley Sanchez used careful positioning to cut Salem off as a passing option from the Thorns defense.

When Salem did get the ball, oftentimes Washington would actively drop away from her, preferring to get into a defensive shape rather than trying to win the ball or even force a particular pass. As a result, Salem had the most touches—about .75 per minute—she’s had in any of the last four games, as well as the most attempted passes and the second-highest passing accuracy, at 85.4%.

Leaving Salem largely alone meant players were always available to tightly guard Rocky Rodríguez, Celeste Boureille, and Moultrie, and accordingly, the Thorns found little joy playing through the middle. The Spirit were also selective in marking Meghan Klingenberg and Christen Westphal: they were allowed to send an aimless long ball up the flank, or pass back to the center backs, but were consistently blocked from more targeted forward passes. When they tried to link up with a midfielder, wingers Trinity Rodman or Ashley Hatch would close them down aggressively.

Finally, Washington defended pretty compactly, both horizontally and vertically. That often had the effect of encouraging hopeful long balls, and it also sometimes stretched the Thorns’ back line, as the Spirit would keep dropping as the center backs advanced, and Kling and Westphal pushed higher and higher into the space they were given:

A screenshot showing Washington in their defensive shape, with Kelli Hubly, who is carrying the ball, being left open.

Portland’s defense isn’t egregiously out of shape here, but you can see both Kling and Westphal advancing up the wings, with Kelli Hubly being given few passing options. Five minutes after this, the Spirit came within inches of scoring—stopped only by Westphal’s heroic save off the line—after Menges took a hard touch and gave up the ball with the two outside backs in an even more attacking posture.

So, how did the Thorns manage to score? Moultrie’s impressive crossing ability aside, I would like to call attention to how she positioned herself on the play leading up to it. In the shot below, the problem Washington is about to have is quite clear: with left back Anna Heilferty tracking Simone Charley, Moultrie has a big ol’ space in front of her. Here Boureille has just passed to Emily Menges, who will find Moultrie as she runs into that space.

A screenshot showing Olivia Moultrie unmarked on the right wing, with a large space in front of her, as Celeste Boureille is passing the ball from the midfield back to Emily Mentes.

This was well read by the teen, who found a way to leverage the Spirit’s defensive strategy against them. While Moultrie was generally closely watched by Andi Sullivan while in that central pocket in front of the Spirit’s back line, here she’s figured out that if she drifts wide, the Washington midfield loses track of her, with Tori Huster, Dorian Bailey, and Sullivan worrying about Rodríguez, Boureille, and Salem, respectively.

Just after this screenshot, Hatch could tell what was about to happen—she pointed back toward Moultrie—but she seems to have been torn between dropping back to pick up Moultrie and continuing to watch Westphal, as she was asked to do throughout the game.

Charley also played a key role in setting this up, as she dragged Heilferty inside to open up that space on the right. This isn’t flashy stuff, just a well-worked play that found a weakness in Washington’s defensive setup.

Outside of the near miss in the first half, Portland also defended well, and Washington struggled to find many chances. Overall, this was the most decisive performance yet over the full 90 minutes by this junior Thorns team.

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Soccer Thorns

Takeaways: Thorns 1, Dash 0

Photo by Nikita Taparia

From the second the whistle blew, the Thorns looked like they were going to dominate the Dash, with Sophia Smith scoring the fastest Thorns goal ever 32 seconds into the match. However, Smith’s goal would be the only one that Portland scored that night, holding the Dash to a 1–0 win on the road.

As a team who has “struggled with scoring,” said Kelli Hubly after the match,” it was really special to score early on the road.” Putting themselves on the board early was a needed confidence boost. However, the Thorns struggled to add to that tally, despite playing a great defensive game. 

Here are a couple of my takeaways from the match:

1. 90-minute defensive mentality

The Thorns were dominant against the Pride last week, holding a 2–0 lead for 93 minutes. Then, in the last minute of stoppage time, they conceded on a strike from outside the box. This week against the Dash, the Thorns immediately worked on correcting their mistakes, remaining committed to defense until the very end of stoppage time.

The Thorns led the Dash on duels won, interceptions, tackles, and aerial duels, spread not just across the defense but the midfield and forwards as well. One area of defense where the Thorns did particularly well was tracking back on wide balls that Houston would attempt to play. By preventing players like Jasmyne Spencer and Makamae Gomera-Stevens from getting crosses or passes off inside the 18-yard box after quick turnovers, the Thorns successfully shut down most of the Dash’s shooting angles, giving Bella Bixby an easy job that night. The cohesion between Natalia Kuikka, Hubly, Emily Menges, and Meghan Klingenberg was evident.

After the match, Rocky Rodríguez spoke about the team’s defensive mentality, saying that they “had a lot to lose” and the Thorns “need to get better at closing out games, especially if [they] are winning.” Those last twenty minutes of the game are crucial to securing three points, and players have to keep working hard even as they are beginning to tire. Parsons’s substitutions, which slotted defensive players like Christen Westphal and Meaghan Nally into the midfield to help overwhelm Houston’s offensive-minded substitutions, worked. The Thorns’ game changers came in and locked down the win, bringing accurate passes and high pressure and holding Houston to only 13 shots. Rodríguez’s statement is true—the Thorns do need to work on closing out games—but they’re already showing improvement from last week. 

2. Defense wins games, but scoring helps too

When Sophia Smith set the new club record for fastest goal, it seemed as though Portland was going to have another performance à la the season opener against Chicago, where they went  up 4–0 in the first half.

Unfortunately, Smith’s goal was the only one for a Thorns side that has struggled to score in recent games. The Thorns have had no problem getting the ball into their attacking third. Last night, they had 50 more accurate passes in their attacking half than the Dash had on them, even without their midfield of international stars. Rodríguez, Angela Salem, and Celeste Boureille link up in the diamond well, and are able to control the ball and distribute to Smith, Simone Charley, and Marissa Everett, but where the Thorns are struggling is getting off that final cross or shot on goal. All players are rising to the occasion of getting more time than they had been seeing prior to the Olympics, and are beginning to find their groove and consistency with this new starting lineup. 

While typically the Thorns outshoot their opponents two to one, against Houston they only registered 14 shots to the Dash’s 13. To the eye, that decrease was clear, with Charley and Smith often taking one too many touches before getting a cross blocked, or a defender crashing on them, neither one of them making an accurate cross on the night. With a team full of talented attackers and a midfield with good rates of distribution and control, there should be more shots on goal. Being able to set themselves up with a wider margin of goals will only complement the Thorns’ defense as they work on closing games without conceding more consistently. 

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Soccer Thorns

Takeaways: Thorns 2, Pride 1

Photo by Kris Lattimore

The Thorns bested the Orlando Pride 2–1 on Sunday in a dominant performance capped off with a headed goal by Marissa Everett and a wondergoal by Sophia Smith. Marisa Viggiano’s freakish (in a good way) strike in second-half stoppage time capped the scoring off.

After the game, Mark Parsons pointed out that initially, Orlando stayed compact centrally and tried to keep the Thorns confined to wide areas. Forwards Crystal Thomas and Taylor Kornieck would drop down in the half spaces to help defend, but the Pride generally didn’t try to win the ball back there, instead aiming to keep Portland from passing into the center of the field. Here Kelli Hubly has just received the ball from Meghan Klingenberg. With Thomas and Kornieck flanking Meggie Dougherty Howard, the Pride have blocked off all the passing lanes toward the center.

A screenshot that shows Kelli Hubly with the ball on the left wing, with Crystal Thomas and Taylor Kornieck dropped deep to help Meggie Dougherty Howard defend.

Orlando did, however, let Portland switch the ball to the weak side. Just after the shot above, Hubly will send a long pass to Natalia Kuikka. The Pride generally didn’t attack the ball when Kuikka or Kling had it.

Because they weren’t challenged much out wide, Kuikka and Kling had a lot of time and space to create from those areas, either sending in crosses or combining with teammates who over- or underlapped them. They ended the game with 89 and 91 touches, respectively, and 51 and 59 passes. That’s around 20 more touches and ten more passes than each of them had last week against Gotham.

In the second half, Marc Skinner reorganized, benching midfielder Erika Tymrak, moving Syd Leroux to the wing, and bringing on forward Abi Kim to play in a 4-4-2 alongside Kornieck. Now the Pride did attack the ball on the wing, including when Kuikka and Kling were carrying it, but they tended to send only one player at a time to do so. That often meant that the two outside backs, who are both strong dribblers, simply bypassed the pressure and found a central pass.

I wrote in my last recap that one of the Thorns’ strengths is the consistency in the way they play each game, especially on the defensive side. They do try to win the ball on the wing (a subject for another post), and are often successful, presumably because the whole team has drilled that trap over and over again.

I’m not sure how you can expect to switch defensive strategies mid-game like Orlando did against a team that specifically does not do that and have things go well—especially, to be frank, given that the Thorns have better players! Outside backs Kylie Strom and Courtney Petersen both got beaten wide by the likes of Morgan Weaver, Smith, and the two outside backs multiple times, outclassed both skill-wise and physically, and looked very frustrated by the end of the first half.

To rewind a bit, when the Thorns don’t succeed in winning the ball on the wing, they know where they’re supposed to run after, and they all do it very quickly—again, presumably because they’ve practiced it a lot.

That’s another problem Orlando had: Portland got a number of good chances on transition simply because the Pride didn’t seem to think of that possibility and didn’t respond fast enough. The setup to Smith’s gorgeous strike is one example of this.

Below, center back Ali Krieger is winding up to take a free kick. Midfielder Dougherty Howard is open, but Krieger—maybe preemptively wary of Smith and Everett pressuring Dougherty Howard from behind?—is going to pass to Petersen, pushed out of frame up on the left wing, where the arrow points.

Right center back Ali Krieger is about to take a long free kick from Orlando's defensive half. An arrow indicates that Orlando left back Courtney Peterson is pushed far up the left wing, out of frame, leaving a wide gap on Portland's right.

This one is blurry, so I circled the ball. It wasn’t a good kick, so it’s falling in the direction of the arrow, to the feet of Rocky Rodríguez, not Petersen. It’s hard to tell in the screenshot, but Smith is anticipating where Rodríguez will pass: ahead of her run, into the massive Orlando-free space that’s there because five of the team’s outfield players were just pushing toward goal.Portland's defensive half is shown. The ball, which is in midair, is circled, with an arrow indicating its trajectory. It is falling toward Rocky Rodriguez.

Rodríguez indeed passes there—with a clever first-touch tap—and Smith is basically free and clear to sprint up Portland’s right wing. Petersen chases her, getting in a shove from behind at one point, but Smith keeps running, stays outside Orlando’s stranded center backs, and fires off a sweet right-footed strike from the top of the 18.

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Soccer Thorns

Thorns 2, Louisville 0: Takeaways: Stream of Consciousness Edition

Photo by Nikita Taparia

The Thorns earned a comfortable if unspectacular three points on the road today against Racing Louisville FC. With much of the starting lineup away with the US and Canadian national teams to prepare for the Olympics, we saw a return to a B-side Thorns lineup that we’ve gotten pretty familiar with by now.

So far we’ve always done these recaps in a list format, but I don’t feel like doing that tonight, so I’m just going to let this one ~flow~.

Something I find interesting about this iteration of the Thorns is the consistency of tactics from game to game, regardless of lineup or opponent. It’s not like they don’t adjust at all, but they’ve played the same formation since the 2020 Challenge Cup, and their defensive strategy, especially, is very consistent regardless of who’s on the field. This hasn’t always been Mark Parsons’s approach; the first few years I covered the team saw them deploy multiple shapes in each season and use pressing systems that changed depending on player availability.

What’s remarkable about this on the defensive side is that in the past, when the back line wasn’t consistent—often the case when Emily Sonnett and Ellie Carpenter were in and out of national team camps and players like Emily Menges and Meghan Klingenberg dealt with injuries—its performance suffered. But this season has already seen at least as much defensive turnover as any past Parsons season (I think it’s more, but I’m not going to dig up my 2017–2018 notebook to check, sorry), and the team has the third fewest goals allowed in the league, behind North Carolina and the ungodly lucky Gotham FC.

I’m… not sure why that is. It might be as simple as “the team has a lot of depth,” which they do. But it feels like there’s more than that—the press is so organized and effective, and the team’s quality in that area changes basically not at all, regardless of lineup.

Anyway, back to today: we did see some changes, importantly with Celeste Boureille and Marissa Everett slotting in for Lindsey Horan and Christine Sinclair. With Crystal Dunn also out, Rocky Rodríguez and Angela Salem both started, where they’ve been tagging in for each other. Those changes did make a difference offensively; there’s simply no replacing the creative genius those players provide, and the Thorns spent most of their attacking energy moving up the wings, and quite a bit of it sending in aimless crosses. On that point, though, it also has to be said that Louisville did well to stay compact centrally and force the Thorns wide. They didn’t press high, and once they dropped into their defensive block, Portland wasn’t able to break them down.

The Thorns’ distribution actions against Louisville (attacking toward the top). I am so sorry about the absolutely godawful quality, but the website only works for me on mobile now. Hopefully you can see my point, which is the little pocket around the 18 where there’s not much going on. Also note the number of crosses, and their redness.

On the other hand—and this brings me back to my earlier point about the defense—Boureille did a bang-up job defensively, notching three tackles and running the length of the field, Horan-like, throughout the 90 minutes. Angela Salem, as always, was a bulldog, shutting down the handful of Louisville attacks that made their way into Portland’s defensive third, and ending the game with four chances created.

The Everett-Sinc difference is even bigger, and probably represents the biggest change in what the team is capable of going forward. Everett does the hard defensive work well, and she managed to get into the box at the right moment a number of times, but she is simply not Christine Sinclair, OC, and she’s not the same kind of link between the midfield and the forwards as the captain is.

So in short, where the full Thorns team can score any number of ways, this lineup was more or less limited to a subset of that toolbox: set pieces, balls over the top, and quick transition plays. They had a few decent looks on transition in the first half, but ultimately either lacked precision in finishing or hesitated too long and couldn’t move the ball fast enough through the final third.

But the goals came anyway, the first from a confidently shot Rocky Rodríguez penalty (after she was fouled off a corner kick), and the second when Simone Charley found the end of a sweet lofted pass by Menges (after a corner kick Kling took short), marking the defender’s first-ever Thorns assist.

The game had been all but over for a while by the time the thing this game will be remembered for happened. Fifteen-year-old Olivia Moultrie usurped Ellie Carpenter as the youngest-ever player to get minutes in an NWSL game when she subbed in for Salem after 83 minutes. And after all the noise around whether she should be allowed to sign a professional contract, the lawsuit, the media blitz, the numberless tweets—perhaps unsurprisingly, she was fine. She didn’t stand out as great, but she didn’t get bodied, either. She won the ball a couple times, lost it a couple, made some passes. Pretty standard stuff for a late-game sub, which is very impressive given her age.

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Soccer Thorns

Takeaways: Portland 1, Kansas City 0

Photo by Matthew Wolfe

The Thorns held on for the three points on Sunday in a match featuring Simone Charley’s second regular season goal (!!), 80% fan capacity at Providence Park (!!), and some very warm weather for a late June Portland afternoon.

Here are a couple of my takeaways from the game:

1. A turning point, of sorts

I’ve talked a lot about the Thorns and missed chances this year, and I think this game was (hopefully) a turning point in that regard. It’s not that Portland did an especially good job on capitalizing on their chances—they recorded 20 shots on the afternoon, with only one goal to show for it—and it’s weird to say this match marked a shift right before five players step away from the team for the Olympics.

Still, I think Mark Parsons said it best when asked about Christine Sinclair’s missed penalty after the match:

“I think the team were excellent because we missed chances. I think we missed three or four chances that we should score. And I thought, in other games that could affect our decisions. OL Reign or Orlando, when we went through that period, a decision starts to get a bit more desperate, and we were starting to force things or take things on early or not play as fluid, as free in our decision making. I thought it was the opposite today.”

It doesn’t hurt that Simone Charley was the one who scored, either—both because she had the most good looks on goal of any player in the first half and because she’ll still be around through Olympic absences.

“For me personally, it was great to be able to get a goal and use that as momentum going into the Olympic break,” Charley said. “I think you got a taste of seeing how deep our team is, so I’m pretty excited for these upcoming weeks.”

2. 2019 flashbacks, anyone?

I hope I’m not the only one who saw Sunday’s lineup and immediately thought of the last time Sinc played as a dual No. 9 for the Thorns—specifically alongside Tobin Heath in Portland’s Very Weird last two games of 2019.

Fortunately, things were different this time around. Parsons said Tyler Lussi, Sophia Smith, and Morgan Weaver were all dealing with small injuries going into the match, and Charley had taken some time off during the international break for personal reasons.

(It was probably less fortunate for Elizabeth Ball—both in terms of her team losing the match and in terms of being on the receiving end of an interesting yellow card for “the offense of handling the ball to stop a promising attack,” according to match officials.)

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Soccer Thorns

Takeaways: Thorns 3, Racing Louisville 0

Photo by Matthew Wolfe

The Thorns coasted to a confident 3–0 win against Racing Louisville last night on the strength of goals by Angela Salem (!!!), Rocky Rodríguez, and Lindsey Horan. Although Louisville struggled to put together much of an attack, it was one of Portland’s most complete performances all year. Even with Christine Sinclair unavailable, their usual game plan worked exactly the way it was supposed to, and just as important, the gals showed progress against their perennial bugbear of ludicrously unlucky finishing.

1. The press, perfected

On the defensive side of the ball, Portland’s press clicked last night better than it has all season, barring maybe the 5–0 Red Stars blowout. They didn’t do anything new, they just looked extremely well-organized at the same scheme they’ve been implementing all season.

In broad strokes, the Thorns’ pressing strategy in the defensive phase consists of encouraging their opponent to move wide, cutting off options into the center of the field, and trapping them on the wings. Here’s an example of how that worked last night:

As Tony points out, most players aren’t pressing the ball here, but constricting the space and limiting Louisville’s options when it comes to passing centrally. After chasing the ball to outside back Emily Fox on the left wing, Fox only has one option, which is to pass backwards to center back Kaleigh Riehl. Riehl, in turn, has no options going forward and has to throw the ball away.

The Thorns also deployed a suffocating counter-press that bore fruit several times—including a moment that led indirectly to Salem’s opening goal in the eighth minute.

The Thorns have just lost possession here, but—because of Rodríguez, Weaver, and Horan cutting off passing lanes, and Simone Charley hovering near Fox—Louisville midfielder Freja Olofsson has nowhere to pass but straight back:

Riehl receives the pass, but quickly gets hemmed in herself, as Weaver and Charley both charge toward her, and Rodríguez and Dunn mark Olofsson and Fox, respectively, eliminating them both as options:

Dunn and Rodríguez close in and, with no remaining choice besides booting the ball to the moon, Riehl dribbles straight into the trap the four Thorns players have created:

From here, Weaver strips the ball off Riehl, dribbles a few yards to the left, and takes a powerful shot that bounces off a Louisville defender for a Thorns corner. Racing is sloppy clearing the ball on Kling’s initial service, and it eventually falls to Salem, who scores.

2. The midfield balanced structure and fluidity

The midfield last night consisted of Salem, Rodríguez, Horan, and Dunn, who slotted in for Christine Sinclair as the captain had already departed for the international break. The beautiful thing about this group is that Dunn, Rodríguez, and Horan can all play any central midfield role, so what we saw was quite a bit of fluidity among the group. Dunn, nominally the No. 10, would drop deep fairly often, with Horan and Rodríguez often making runs into the box ahead of her. Salem, the No. 6, had the most restricted role, but still roamed quite a bit.

Heat maps for Dunn (left) and Salem (right) are below:

Data from Wyscout, courtesy of NWSL Analitica

It’s clear which player is which. Salem, the No. 6, has more actions in Portland’s defensive half (of course, Portland spent most of their time attacking, so no one did a ton back there), while Dunn hung out a lot in the space between Louisville’s midfield and defense, as well as getting into the box. But there’s also non-negligible overlap between the two players; Dunn dropped deeper at times, and Salem also got forward into that same pocket outside the 18.

After the game, Salem noted that the midfield “felt really fluid” and explained the group has been working on their organization, saying, “Sometimes with [our] midfield, we’re not always balanced, because we have such an attacking mindset in there. The focus has really been on just creating balance and holding space and staying disciplined. I think the midfielders all did that tonight.”

Here are the two No. 8s, Horan (left) and Rodríguez (right):

Data from Wyscout, courtesy of NWSL Analitica

These two have a little less freedom than Dunn, but only horizontally, as each of them mostly sticks to one side of the field. Vertically, they both spend significant time in both halves of the field.

Like the team’s press, none of this is new—what I wrote above is the definition of a box-to-box midfielder—but last night, it all snapped into place in a new way, with everyone choosing their moments to get forward while staying attuned to the movements of the other three and ensuring they weren’t leaving areas of empty space. Salem is the holding mid, but all three of the others could be seen playing deeper than her at times. This is what you get when you put together three players who are all among the best in the world at their preferred position, and almost as good at a handful of others, and give them a few months to train together.

One other thing I want to point out from those heat maps: Horan? She does a lot! We all know this, but even if you know it, she does more than you probably realize.

3. Some numbers

This was another very lopsided match: The Thorns registered 28 shots to Louisville’s 4, putting 12 on frame. Louisville had zero shots on target.

As dire as Racing’s offense was, however, it’s also worth noting that defensively, they put up more of a fight than Chicago in their big loss, or the Reign in their Challenge Cup match. Obviously, they didn’t succeed in stopping Portland’s attack, but there was visible organization in their press, so it’s not like they rolled out the welcome mat for the Thorns. In the first half, they won 25 duels to the Thorns’ 17. That dropped to 23 and 26, respectively, in the second half, likely as Louisville’s arduous journey to Portland caught up with them.

Finally, Portland significantly out-possessed and out-passed their opponents: 59.6% to 41.4%, and 517 to 375 total passes, respectively. As with the duel numbers, the second half was substantially more lopsided in both respects.

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Soccer Thorns

Exclusive Interview: Madison Pogarch

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Soccer Thorns

Takeaways: Portland 5, Chicago 0

Photo by Matthew Wolfe

The Thorns finally put it all together yesterday. In a 5–0 dismantling of the Red Stars, the moments of disconnect and bad luck that had kept Portland from dominating throughout the Challenge Cup fell away, and the girls in (black and) red looked like the fully armed and operational battle station we’ve been waiting for.

Sophia Smith scored a brace, though I’d argue she scored two and a half, as it was her powerful shot that deflected into the net off Tierna Davidson. A Christine Sinclair penalty and a right-place, right-time finish by Tyler Lussi—who pounced when Alyssa Naeher fumbled a save—closed out the scoring.

Read on for some of my takeaways from the weekend:

1. Reversion (progression?) to the mean

This was clearly Portland’s best performance to date, but it didn’t represent a huge leap in quality as much as it did all the pieces finally falling into place. We all knew the Thorns were good; that they hadn’t been this good before Sunday really does look like a combination of bad luck and insufficient time training as a full squad. These goals were always coming. It was only a question of which unlucky opponent they’d get unloaded on.

To review some numbers: the Thorns posted more than 20 shots in two of their five Challenge Cup games, including 26 in the final and 29, a club record, against the Reign. They ended Sunday’s game with 22, including 10 on target and 18 from inside the box.

Look at the xG for the 1–1 Challenge Cup final and the 5–0 regular season opener, and you may notice some similarities:

A lot of the chances that went wasted against Tacoma and Gotham came down to bad luck—Sophia Smith, in particular, looked totally snakebit last weekend—but yesterday, the team also solved a lot of the little miscommunications and disconnects that have shown up in previous games.

“We got everyone up to speed,” said Mark Parsons after the game. “What we saw today happened just before the FIFA [international] players broke off. We were playing like this for a couple weeks. Everyone returned, and what are we on now? Week three, week four? Around the same time the understanding became, rather than people thinking about what we need to do, it’s more subconscious and they’re just doing and having fun.”

2. The midfield had plenty of time and space

The Red Stars changed things up for Sunday and lined up in a 4-3-3, I assume because they were short a midfielder with Morgan Gautrat unavailable. This proved to be a mistake.

To start with, there’s an obvious numerical imbalance in the midfield, with Portland lining up in their usual diamond shape: Chicago’s No. 10, Vanessa DiBernardo, was largely tasked with marking Rocky Rodríguez, while Danielle Colaprico and Julie Ertz rotated between Christine Sinclair, Lindsey Horan, and Crystal Dunn. (When you put it like that, it doesn’t sound good for the Red Stars, does it?) Chicago’s wingers would sometimes help with Portland’s No. 8s, but since they were also responsible for Christen Westphal and Meghan Klingenberg, that always left either Dunn or Horan unmarked.

Still, with a sufficiently organized press, all that can be okay. Except the Red Stars’ press was not organized. This is just before Kling drew the penalty that led to Portland’s second goal:

The defensive disorganization is obvious: Dunn looks to have at least four passes available at this moment. Just before this, Ertz did succeed in forcing Rocky to pass backwards. On the other hand, DiBernardo has gotten lost, caught in the open because she wasn’t sure whether to press the back line or cut off a passing lane, and Colaprico has been caught ball-chasing and left Sinc open. In other words, not only are the Red Stars outnumbered in the center of the field, they aren’t effective in using the numbers they do have.

Making matters even worse, the mismatch wasn’t just numerical, but personnel-related, at many positions. Rocky turned DiBernardo a number of times, Christen Westphal handled Kealia Watt with ease, and Smith and Morgan Weaver stretched Chicago’s back line like taffy.

3. Portland shredded the Red Stars in transition

Speaking of which, two goals yesterday—and a handful of good chances—came from quick attacks in transition, either off counterattacks originating in the Thorns’ defensive third or from fast restarts by AD Franch. Smith and Weaver looked unstoppable, with Weaver sprinting at the back line to receive a long pass and Smith making the second run behind her. Franch’s distribution, not just fast but pinpoint accurate, is also to be lauded here.

This was another area where Chicago’s disorganization, and eventually (understandably!), a palpable sense of defeat, undid them. In the sequence leading to Smith’s second goal, three of the Red Stars’ defenders are sprinting shoulder-to-shoulder toward their goal after her. Then Arin Wright tries to hold Smith offside in what looks like a spur-of-the-moment decision—and ironically, Wright is herself the one keeping Smith onside, albeit just barely:

It’s a small moment, but it feels emblematic of how far out of step Chicago was throughout the game.

In short, we shouldn’t expect Portland to be this dominant in every game—but we did get a good look at the tools that are available when the squad is at full strength.

Categories
Soccer Thorns

Takeaways: Thorns Tie Gotham in Regulation, Win in Penalties

Photo by Matthew Wolfe

It has been a while since we’ve heard the words “10 a.m. means nothing anymore” on a Thorns broadcast. And while I—and many others—miss listening to Ann Schatz when I stream Portland home games, it’s probably good to not tell your fans that 10 a.m. means nothing ahead of a 10 a.m. tournament final.

So, I may not have gotten anything from the McDonald’s breakfast menu on Saturday morning, but I did watch the Thorns lift the 2021 Challenge Cup trophy at Providence Park after beating NJ/NY Gotham FC on penalties.

Here’s what I took away from the match.

1. A couple goals were scored

For two teams who have conceded a total of five goals across a collective eight matches during the Challenge Cup’s group stage, both of the game’s goals felt incredibly silly.

Christine Sinclair did a pretty fun thing early on, in which she took the ball off Carli Lloyd (who then ran into Sinclair rather than trying to take the ball back), turned, took a couple touches before goal, and got the shot off as Gina Lewandowski made a half-attempt to step to her. It was a good chance on Sinclair’s part, even as it was a pretty foolish lack of defensive pressure on Gotham’s.

Still, the NJ/NY side got their payback when Lloyd headed Imani Dorsey’s cross into the back of the net in the 61st minute. Like Sinclair’s goal, it’s not particularly good defense; Becky Sauerbrunn either misread the ball or wasn’t aware that Lloyd was standing right there and didn’t jump high enough, and AD Franch was caught watching as the ball spun into the back of the net. (Admittedly, it’s close enough range that it would’ve been impressive if Franch had gotten there, but it’s got to sting when you’re not fully set for that shot.)

2. Minus the aforementioned goal, Portland’s defense is scary good

When Mark Parsons talked to media ahead of the Houston game, he said Natalia Kuikka was playing at a three or four out of 10 compared to her potential. I’m still trying to fully process that comment; to me, she’s been easily among Portland’s best players this year, and the thought that we’ve seen less than 50% of what she’s capable of is absolutely wild.

All this is to say Kuikka had yet another stellar game for the Thorns, especially in the first half. At some point during the first 45 minutes, I wrote “Kuikka vs Monaghan is a silly matchup” in my notes, and I think that sums up the defensive end of things pretty well. On the offensive side:

https://twitter.com/NwslAnalitica/status/1391084067102334979?s=20

And she wasn’t alone. Kelli Hubly deserves a shoutout for her work throughout the morning, and so does Meghan Klingenberg, who did a fantastic job of containing Gotham’s attack.

Parsons gave Kling just that, in response to a postgame question about her attacking presence:

“I love her attacking play. I think in decision making, build up, some of the passes that she’s playing in behind the back line, the distribution, the crossing, the crossing quality, how many goals, she could she could have shot. Let’s talk about how to defending because Gotham went after her a little bit today. Purce moves over to the other wing after 30 minutes in the first half, because she couldn’t get a look on Kling. And Monahan struggled against her. We saw against Houston with Prince, Kling has come up absolutely big. And you know, in training, we’ve had some one-v-one all out wars with, with Kling being someone that people just can’t beat. Her technical one-v-one defending ability is some of the very, very, very best.”

Photo by Matthew Wolfe
3. PKs!

Portland may have won the Challenge Cup at home, but they also did so in their first ever penalty shootout. I don’t really want to run through the whole thing—it was very stressful live, and we don’t need to bring it up again—but I am still very much in awe of Franch’s save to win the Thorns the trophy. She deserves both the roses between her teeth.

5. Handles

A snippet from yesterday’s presser with Franch and Kling:

Katelyn Best: You guys have won two trophies for the Thorns now. I’m just wondering how you would rate the actual Challenge Cup in terms of its aesthetic and utilitarian qualities.

Kling: We’re rating the trophies now? That’s hilarious.

I just like that it’s a cup. You know, we call it a cup. They gave us a cup.

Franch: We drank from the cup.

Kling: We drank from the cup.

[…]

Kling: Honestly, if you’re rating the cup, I would say I really like the big handles. I feel like the big handles are big here.

Franch: Yeah, you can hold it.

Kling: Yeah.

Franch: Two people can hold it.

Kling: I mean, you’ve got to give it a rating out of 10.

Franch: Maybe you could have a couple more handles, and it would be a 10.

Kling: More handles? How many more handles do you need?

Franch: For everybody.

Kling: I just want it to be a bigger cup.

Franch: So you can fit in it and bathe in it?

Kling: Yeah.

6. I still don’t know what Simone Charley’s yellow card was for, and at this point I’m too afraid to ask