Backpass: Let's Not Houston in the Playoffs
There were some subtle tweaks to the way Colorado lined up against Houston. Let's think about that, and why it didn't work.
Last week’s match against Houston was very much the kind of dull, patient road match we used to expect all the time from Pablo Mastroeni, but haven’t seen a lot of under Robin Fraser. Nobody really liked it. Not Rapids fans:
And not Robin Fraser hisself:
So let’s talk a little about what were the changes Robin mentioned, maybe why they didn’t work, and what we might see in the next two weeks instead.
The changes were on defense. On offense, the Rapids were doing pretty much their normal thing: come out in a 5-3-2, swing the ball around a lot, force the opponent to move and change shape, pass into a gap to create a shot or maybe get fouled and make magic happen on a set piece or corner.
The defense looked different than usual, and so I clipped four videos to demonstrate. Substack won’t embed video, so you’ll have to click on the tweets to get them. Do not fear, they will open in another tab.
The defense is sitting in a mid-high block 5-3-2. The personnel here is interesting: Dominique Badji and Michael Barrios up top; Younes Namli, Jack Price, and Mark-Anthony Kaye in the middle, and a pretty regular back-five.
First of all, I really like a Badji-Barrios pairing, in terms of attacking. You get Barrios’ speed and Badji’s post-up-and-dunk in the six-yard box ability, not to mention his back-to-goal work. The two create space for one another, especially if they find themselves moving forward together in transition. Which, unfortunately, we really didn’t see so much of on this day.
Then there’s Namli as a central midfielder, which I literally would have never imagined in my entire life. His best asset is dribbling, and he’s usually a wide attacker, so having him in a defensively important mid-to deep spot is kinda odd. I think this is exactly what Robin Fraser means when he says “We tried to change some things and it did not work.”
For a guy that was supposed to be the big DP offensive spark, you got 14 for 21 passing1 and 4 Chances Created (that’s good!) plus an assist (yay!) and he went 2 of 2 on Successful Dribbles / Dribbles Attempted. All that offensive goodness is matched against the bad, in both offense and defense: zero shots taken; 0 Clearances, 1 Tackle (on 3 attempts), 0 Interceptions (that’s pretty bad).
Put it altogether and it’s very interesting - meaning, it’s kind of what you’d expect if you put Younes Namli in a deeper role … that he’d be an attacking catalyst but he’d give up a lot defensively. It is reminiscent of the play of Darlington Nagbe : he’s got his head on a swivel, he can’t be dispossessed, and he’s very dribbly, but if you start Nagbe that deep, he’s a defensive liability, and it also limits the odds that he’ll score goals. I don’t think the experiment for Namli was a success, but I kind of liked it anyway, if that makes sense?
Back to our video: you can see that as Houston swings it around, the Rapids near-side midfielder will close down space to the ball - that’s Namli at the bottom of your screen at the start of the video, and then a few seconds later, Kaye at the top closing down the space to the ball. Note that they don’t **press** the ball, they merely close down the space somewhat. Meanwhile, Jack Price gets into an ‘interception’ space. The defenders are moving as a block and working to cut the passing lines. Meanwhile, by doing this, they’re giving Houston oodles of time on the ball, which can be dangerous.
Let’s see another example:
Here it is a few minutes later off an inbound. Barrios, Badji, and Namli are up high and on the other side of the attack, looking to strike in transition if the Rapids can regain possession. Lucas Esteves and Kaye are defending on the ball side, but they get cut out pretty quick, leaving **just Jack Price** defending Adalberto Carraquilla2 with three options before him: Griffin Dorsey, Ariel Lassiter, and Memo Rodriguez. He gives it to Lassiter, who sees before him huge tracts of land.3 Lassiter blows it - he doesn’t explode into space and take his chance, and Namli and Price close him down, and then Kaye runs into him, like a boob.
This moment worked out ok, but more because Houston made a hash of it than because the Rapids 5-3-2 zonal defense did a good thing. This was a bad defensive moment that Colorado got away with. Speaking of which, here’s another one:
Carraquilla has the ball. Jack Price is sitting in the space between Carraquilla and midfielder Joe Corona, but again, nobody’s pressuring the ball - which is the plan, apparently. Carraquilla passes off to Adam Lundkvist, who has all the time in the world on the ball to pick out the long bomb over the top to a streaking Ariel Lassiter. Lassiter has a golden opportunity 1v1 with Lalas Abubakar, takes the left footed shot, and shanks it fifteen rows up into the crowd.
This moment, and the previous video, answered for me the question ‘Hey, how come the LA Galaxy gave up on Ariel Lassiter and let him go to Houston?’ (Fotmob ultimately recorded no Expected Goals number for this play because it was determined to be offside.) Lassiter’s overall xG for the day of 0.04 is not good. Lassiter hasn’t been a regular starter for Houston, and his 0.36 xG per 96 minutes played is actually decent - identical to Ricardo Pepi’s 0.36 xGp96. The difference is: Pepi has 13 goals in 2201 minutes, while Lassiter has 0 goals through 521 minutes.
My point is, while this kind of defensive approach held the Rapids to a nil-nil draw at the half against Houston; overall record 6-12-15; I do not think it would work against any of the better teams in the league. Because Raul Ruidiaz and Robin Lod and Lucas Zelerayan are not Ariel Lassiter.
The Rapids, smartly, made some adjustments at the half.
Houston is building from the back. Badji presses the ball! Then Barrios presses the ball all the way back to the keeper4! The keeper passes to Lundkvist, who passes to Carraquilla, who puts on a saucy mode to cut out Jack Price and pings the perfect pass to … Ariel Lassiter, who finishes with the choke job. Forty-five seconds later, the Rapids would score on the other end with a flash of brilliance from Dom Badji, and then lock it down for the final 30 minutes and escape with all three points.
It could be that this formation and defensive style - zone-sitting and line-cutting *interspersed* with surprise moments of hard pressing - might work. And it might be that ‘Younes Namli: Deep Lying Dribble-Drive Nagbe-esque Playmaker’ might work too. But the best midfield for these Rapids is probably Kaye-Price-Acosta, and the best striker pair is either Barrios-Badji or Barrios-Rubio. And the best defensive setup is probably to force the opponent to think fast, play fast, and turn it over, because the Rapids prefer possession to counterattacking. And the best attacking formation for this team is either a 5-2-2-1 or a 5-2-3. And so all of this experiment, while intellectually stimulating, probably didn’t work.
Final note: it’s pretty weird to have one DP on the roster and conclude, just before the playoffs, that his most useful position is ‘68th minute sub off the bench to replace the guy we got from Nashville for $50K in Garber Bux’. But that’s where we are.
I Say: Let’s Win The West
That win puts the Rapids on 58 points, one point behind Seattle, with just one match to go. Colorado could get a win over LAFC on Decision Day and, with the right results from SKC and Seattle, win the Western Conference outright, earning a first round bye in the playoffs and three weeks of rest between matches - November 8-16 is a FIFA international window, and round one of the MLS playoffs begin November 20-21.
Some folks think that winning the Western Conference would be a pyrrhic victory, since three weeks without a game could leave you a bit rust. I’d take it without hesitation. There are two reasons why.
One: a bye is great. It’s a possible loss you don’t have worry about. Every playoff game is a 90 minute war where you’re giving your all and there may be no tomorrow and guys might get hurt. You want to avoid that. You avoid the exhaustion and the strain and the injuries by … skipping the first round entirely.
Two: winning the Western Conference grants you an automatic spot in Concacaf Champions League. And that is worth a lot - both in prestige and in cash money when you ultimately host a big time Liga MX team at Dick’s Sporting Good’s Park. If you don’t win the west automatically, the other berths go to the Supporter’s Shield winner (New England), MLS Cup winner (dunno yet), and the next best record in MLS (also dunno, but if the playoffs started tomorrow, this would be Sporting Kansas City).
MLS Cup is great, and a bye might help get you closer. But for me, even being in CCL, a competition the Rapids have only been involved in twice, is an amazing feat. So I say - play the A team on decision day, and give LAFC the what-for. Don’t worry about rust. Now that I live in Pittsburgh, I know all about rust. It has some charm to it. And also, you shoot a little WD-40 in there, you’re all good.
9 passes in the opponents half, which is very good, and very unique for a central-ish midfielder - having more passes in the opponents half than your own.
A man by the name of Michael Nelson who I had never heard of until today.