Minnesota United was back on the training pitch on Tuesday morning after dropping their season opener on Saturday in Carolina. Here are a few notes on the match, observations from today’s training session and the Northern Pitch Community Match Ratings for week one.
• Bernardo Anor will miss the match against FC Edmonton this Sunday after a nasty head-to-head collision in the second half of Saturday’s match. Anor needed ten staples to his head, and “looked a bit like the Karate Kid” due to his headwrap according to head coach Carl Craig. Carl went on to say that he expected Bernardo to be eligible for the home opener on April 16th.
• After missing the Mexico training trip and staying off of the field for nearly a month, Ibson was in full-contact drills during training today.
• Grant Bell was training with the team again but has not yet been offered a contract.
• Brent Kallman looked to be at 100% following a procedure on his toe a few weeks ago.
• Between the eight or so matches the team’s played (friendly or competitive), they’ve not used the same lineup more than once. The lack of consistent lineups could be a reason why the team seemed to lack cohesion against Carolina with lots of missed passes, ill-timed runs and lost marks.
• Carl Craig was able to take “a lot of positives” from the RailHawks game. “Fitness isn’t quite where it needs to be for this point of the year, but the lads have been great. There’s a really good team here, and we’re on our way to settling into that.” Fifteen of the players stayed on the pitch after training wrapped up, working on distributions from the backline as well as crosses into the box.
Northern Pitch Community Match Ratings: Week One
This weeks community ratings are some of the worst scores our contributors at Northern Pitch have seen the fans hand out. Clearly they were unhappy with what they witnessed in North Carolina last Saturday.
S. Ndjock – 5.0 Tough to argue with this one. He made some good stops and held onto the ball well. That said, we saw Ndjock once again get chipped by a shot from outside of the box.
K. Venegas – 5.2 Venegas spent a lot of time in the middle and attacking thirds. He had a couple of decent runs toward the box, but just couldn’t connect on his crosses. Pushing so far forward there were times when he left the right side of the defense vulnerable.
T. Calvano – 5.0 Possibly the most polarizing player in this week’s ratings, with scores ranging from 2 to 7. He was caught sleeping on the first goal and lost his mark on a near-second goal two minutes later. He looked much more consistent in the second half, including a great recovery sliding tackle to prevent a potential third goal.
D. Lowe – 4.3 Lowe covered most of the right side of the defense as Venegas was bombing forward, and was caught over anticipating the ball in his debut. There were some solid clearances as well as a fantastic pass forward to assist on Christian Ramirez’ opening strike. Still, not a good start for his United career.
J. Davis – 4.7 Rounding out the defense, Davis made a lot of good attacking runs but couldn’t land on his crosses. He accounted for only one tackle on the day.
J. Brovsky – 5.4 Very solid debut for the most recent United signing. Brovsky anchored the central midfield, allowing for the attackers to focus on applying the pressure down the stretch.
G. Jordan – 5.1 Acting as the other 6 in the midfield, Jordan covered a lot of ground, even drifting to a pseudo-right back position. The chippiest player on the field for either side, though his passing and marking weren’t up to his usual standards.
B. Anor – 4.2 A mixed bag for the winger in his debut, who seemed to finally be settling in before leaving the game in the second half. He was subbed off in the 60th minute. At times he seemed guilty of crowding too far toward center and giving Speas little room to operate.
B. Speas – 4.4 Didn’t land a single pass into the box, but stayed back as more of a central midfielder than an attacker in the match. He was replaced in the 70th minute.
D. Cruz – 4.6 The motor was running for Cruz, but like his fellow attacking-midfield debutants, the attacking play just wasn’t lining up against a stout RailHawks defense. Cruz as substituted in the 76th minute.
C. Ramirez – 6.4 No surprise on the Man of the Match, whose half-volley chip of Akira Fitzgerald in the second minute caught international attention. Some other good chances throughout, but looked separated from the distribution as a whole.
Subs:
L. Laing – 5.4
S. Pinho – 4.8
J. Banks – 4.5
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