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Sporting KC experiment with two striker formation
Despite the painful loss, the new formation yielded a major boost in xG.
When Sporting KC released their lineup ahead of the match against LA Galaxy, the graphic showed a new formation. While the team has departed from Peter Vermes’ beloved 4-3-3 at times over his tenure, actually stating it is incredibly rare.
Like Seth Sinovic scoring a goal, rare. It doesn’t happen often, but when it does it means a lot.
The top three choices at right winger were unavailable on Saturday. Johnny Russell did his hamstring, Khiry Shelton had ankle surgery, and Alenis Vargas was called up by Honduras. This left Stephen Afrifa and Marinos Tzionis as the available options. So, Vermes opted for his two strikers and a 4-2-3-1 formation.
It's about that time ⏰#SKCvLA | @BlueKC pic.twitter.com/J515xEFHYx
— Sporting Kansas City (@SportingKC) March 24, 2024
It’s easy to take the painful result for what it was. A loss. But the first half was some of the best soccer the team has played in recent memory.
They hadn’t put up an xG higher than 1.2 in the first four games (MLSsoccer.com). That number jumped to 3.1 against the Galaxy. SKC had an onslaught of shots (17) and corner kicks (6) in the first half which led to two goals. The boost to the offense can’t be ignored.
Of course the tactic worked… until it didn’t.
RECENT – Why can’t Sporting KC close out matches?
Where did things go wrong? Where was Alan Pulido? Is the 4-2-3-1 here to stay?
The newest episode of Shades of Blue brings in Daniel Sperry of the Kansas City Star to help us answer all the questions from another frustrating result for Sporting KC.
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I thought it was great but they needed someone to man-mark Puig when he started to operate further up the field. One of the CFs was man marking him when they were trying to build from deep but they realized moving him upfield basically bypassed the front line press and the double pivots had too many gaps to cover to stay with him. Another midfielder to just track Puig would have put that game away.
And pulido was too gassed to fulfill this role.
I am happy to produce from set pieces, but where are the goals from the run of play?
Early in the season or not, we just are not menacing on the attack. Our menace comes from when players are on a streak and not doing the basic things. Other teams can lapse against us defensively 5 to 10 times and we may score 1 or 2 goals. We lapse the same amount and they score 3 to 7 times depending on Melia’s ability to be a brick wall.
The first half we possessed the ball with purpose and threatened. Our final third was absent where it counted and didn’t provide enough cushion for the fatigue.
We pressed non-stop and failed to adapt or change our game like LA Galaxy did (there’s a statement). In my mind, Vermes the coach either mismanaged the hell out of the game, or Vermes the director failed to build a deep enough roster to account for the standard slew of MLS injuries. He was quoted about using subs early on to avoid injury then failed to make meaningful subs in two games. What happened? Injuries.
I appreciate the “it is still way early in the season” thought process, except this is a pattern of problematic decision-making. We lack discovered depth, lack developmental depth (our academy players are opting for USL due to lack of movement), and the problems of last season are still here.
How many second points have been dropped in the second half?
When we mess up, why do we just crumble? The Galaxy did the exact same play sequence one minute apart.
Is it that we don’t recognize the problem or that we aren’t allowed to adjust the play without Vermes’s permission?
Making the playoffs isn’t the metric of success when more than half the teams qualify. I’m so frustrated because we have the ingredients of wild success, what continues to hold us back?