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Monday MLS Breakdown: Hand Me The Keys, Please
With Dwayne De Rosario now in Toronto, Houston midfielder Stuart Holden has some big shoes to fill. Kyle McCarthy checks in with Holden and finds that the U.S. Olympian is comfortable with his new role and the higher expectations associated with it.
May 4, 2009 10:41:25 AM
By Kyle McCarthy
From the moment Dwayne De Rosario hopped on the plane to Toronto this offseason, Stuart Holden's world changed.
No longer would Holden plug holes or shift from position to position. With De Rosario out of the picture, Holden nestled into a permanent home in central midfield and inherited the duty of driving the Dynamo offense.
“The reins, in a way, have been handed to me,” Holden said after the Dynamo dispatched New England 2-0 yesterday afternoon. “My hard work and my determination over the past few years have earned me this chance. Now that it's been given to me, I'm looking forward to taking it. I don't want to prove Dom wrong. I want to go out and do my best and help this team win.”
Dom – that's Houston head coach Dominic Kinnear to you and me, winner of two MLS Cups as a coach and 54 caps for the United States as a player – thinks the 23-year-old midfielder can fill De Rosario's ample, two-time MLS Cup MVP-winning boots. His teammates expect him to fulfill the promise of three starts and a game-winning goal at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and a call-up to U.S. national team camp this January.
No pressure, right?
“You do (feel it) and you don't,” Holden said. “I look at it as I'm going out to play soccer. At the end of the day, that's what I do best. That's what I came to do. When people look at it, Dwayne's gone. Dwayne was a big part of our team with the two championships, but it's not like I'm a newcomer to this team. I've been here for four years. I'm ready to step up and be a big player for this team.”
Big players produce week-in and week-out. Holden's role, at least for the moment, isn't as pronounced as De Rosario's once was. In Sunday's match against New England, Holden helped to orchestrate the tempo, but didn't find himself at the sharp end often enough despite his willingness to put himself about and make himself an option.
Holden did influence the match in a big way by cashing in on the lottery as his hopeful dribbler of a shot squeezed through the legs of returning Revolution goalkeeper Matt Reis.
“If you don't shoot, you don't score,” Holden said. “I've been holding back a little bit and maybe looking to pass too much. So I took a couple of shots today and I got lucky.”
Luck helped Holden notch his first goal of the season in his sixth match of the campaign. Holden will need to add to the one goal and two assists so far this season to replace the 24 goals and 11 assists De Rosario tallied in his three Dynamo seasons. For a Dynamo team that has rotated through second strikers since moving to Houston, De Rosario's goals always seemed to crop up at the right time to push Houston through.
Inheriting some of that goalscoring burden comes with the territory. Holden brings more two-way play to his version of De Rosario's role, but he also realizes that the Dynamo will need more goals from him even if his buildup play links to and creates for others.
“People look at the stats,” Holden said. “I look at the performance week-in, week-out. I think I've been helping the team and contributing. It was nice to get on the score sheet (today). Hopefully, that will give me a little bit of momentum and a little bit of confidence. I'll keep shooting and hopefully I'll score a few more goals.”
Holden also has to forge a more permanent relationship with central midfield partner Ricardo Clark after appearing alongside him occasionally over the past three seasons. The duo will take some time to develop the chemistry Clark and De Rosario enjoyed, but Holden likes how the partnership is progressing.
“I think we're forming a good tandem in there,” Holden said. “The more we play together, the more we get used to each other. The more we get to know each other, the better we can be as a team. We have a strong midfield and a good team. When things are clicking, we can be a tough team to beat.”
Things haven't clicked particularly well for the Dynamo so far this season. A pulsating 3-2 loss in San Jose showed how potent the Dynamo could be going forward, but defense struggles have alternated with offensive outages – the Dynamo entered Sunday's contest with one goal in its previous three matches – to mire Houston in the middle of the Western Conference pack.
Expectations are far higher than that for the perennial title contenders, even after the Dynamo shook off a 2-5-1 start last season to win the Western Conference regular season crown. Things are looking up after a much-needed victory over Colorado – rescued by a late penalty save by Pat Onstad – and a helpful bye week.
The momentum continued with a rather straightforward victory over the injury-ravaged Revolution. Houston produced its most complete game of the season with the back line rarely troubled and the attack creating numerous chances.
Kinnear said the buzz surrounding his team's slow start didn't accurately reflect the on-field performance.
“We were playing well early in the season,” Kinnear said. “I'm not saying that our troubles are over. We haven't played a perfect game and it's a long season. It's weird when people were starting to think that something was wrong. I don't think anything was wrong. Sometimes, our attack was good and our defense wasn't as good as our attack. Sometimes, it was the other way around.”
Sometimes, everything clicks together. For Holden and the Dynamo, there need to be more days like these as the season progresses. At least if the Dynamo wants to forget the long-locked fellow now plying his trade north of the border.
The final word on “Jersey-gate”
The transformation of Jair Marrufo's informal one-match suspension into a formal two-match ban drew to a close a rather unseemly affair stemming from a jersey exchange between the referee and Chicago star Cuauhtemoc Blanco after last weekend's 2-2 draw between Chicago and Columbus.
U.S. Soccer had no choice but to ban Marrufo. Referees cannot accept gifts, even from family friends. Under the glaring spotlight and the media scrutiny created by last weekend's events, U.S. Soccer could not afford to cut Marrufo a break. Banning or disciplining Blanco appeared a bridge too far, broken guidelines and churlish behavior aside.
I whacked Columbus around a bit in last Wednesday's column for placing too much emphasis on the incident. In hindsight, I wielded too broad of a brush when more subtlety was required. The Crew had to react to the situation at hand and do everything in its power to try to ensure Gino Padula's availability for this weekend's game in Toronto. The emphasis placed upon the supposed gravity of the situation and the tenuous links drawn between Padula's highly suspect red card and Blanco's gift still don't mesh in my mind, but it's tough to blame the Crew for doing what they could do to alert the league to a difficult situation.
Week Seven – Questions, Thoughts, and Answers
Monday MLS Breakdown Player of the Week – Jaime Moreno, FW, D.C. United
Even though his 35-year-old legs are fading, Moreno's class still remains. The veteran Bolivian striker struck twice to give United a 2-1 win over FC Dallas. A delicate and difficult trap on his left foot set up his right-footed finish – aided by some poor goalkeeping by Ray Burse – for the equalizer. There was no doubt about the quality of the second finish, a sumptuous chip over the onrushing Burse to seal all three points. Displays like this only serve as a reminder to how truly outstanding Moreno can be on his day.
“Every year he comes back, people doubt him,” United midfielder Ben Olsen told the Washington Post about Moreno's performance. “I tell people every time, 'Do not doubt this guy. He's going to keep doing what he's doing.' It was a classy performance once again from him.”
What was he thinking? Nick Garcia and Joe Cannon, DF and GK, San Jose
Maybe Garcia and Cannon were still thinking about the nasty clash that drove Chris Leitch from the field. Maybe they were just out to lunch. Maybe they just didn't react as well as they should have.
Possible explanations aside, the veteran pair let a looping Jonathan Bornstein cross bounce inside the six-yard box, a cardinal sin in defensive circles. Chivas USA striker Justin Braun nipped in between the reluctant duo and poked home the winner to settle a rather drab 1-0 affair at Buck Shaw Stadium.
“There was just a hesitation on both our parts, and it's just unfortunate,” Cannon told the San Jose Mercury News. “But what do you do? You hope that it gets cleaned out some way or another. Being that it was in the air so long, Nick probably felt I was definitely coming, and me being the goalie and losing sight of it, I felt Nick was coming for it.”
Eleven observations to start the week
1. Columbus head coach Robert Warzycha surprisingly withdrew Guillermo Barros Schelotto in the 61st minute in Toronto while the Crew were holding a 1-0 lead. Warzycha told reporters after the game that he withdrew Barros Schelotto for two reasons: to save the Argentine playmaker's legs from the BMO Field turf and to prevent a second booking after he had picked up one in the first half.
2. One wonders whether Robbie Rogers would have had the need to utter this quote if the veteran Argentine schemer had played the full 90 minutes. “We need to manage the game at the end a little better,” Rogers told reporters after the match. “We were trying to connect passes and the ball was getting lost and they would counterattack, especially after we scored. ... Sometimes I think we're a little naive and give up the ball way too easily. That's something we need to work on.” Columbus has conceded nine of its 12 goals in the second half, so I'd say finishing out games may not be a strong suit at this
point.
3. “You'd think that the center of your defense should be the strongest,” FC Dallas coach Schellas Hyndman said after his team lost 2-1 at D.C. United. “But both of their goals came through there. That's disappointing.”
4. League officials should take a careful look at the elbow Fredy Montero landed square on Gonzalo Segares' kisser. Referee Jasen Anno rightly sent the Colombian striker from the field. Given the fact that the contact didn't look particularly incidental from this point view, it could merit a further match or two. Then again, that suspension would be tough to take for Seattle considering the inconsistent manner in which MLS referees deal with flying elbows.
5. Even with that point granted, it is a tad bit rich to see the notoriously hard Segares moaning about taking an elbow from Montero and a kick from former teammate Nate Jaqua that left him with a swollen calf. “Lately everybody is trying to hit me,” Segares told the Chicago Tribune. “I don't know why. Maybe they're paying me back for when I used to be one of those guys that would kick people.”
6. Real Salt Lake lost Nick Rimando to a hand injury in the 35th minute of its 2-0 loss in Colorado. Rimando suffered a deep cut on his left middle finger in a collision with Conor Casey. Rimando told the Salt Lake Tribune that he expected to miss two to three weeks because of the injury. Persistent MLS trade target and RSL backup 'keeper Chris Seitz spent the weekend on loan in Portland and will be expected to step in for Wednesday's match at home to Los Angeles.
7. Count me among Zach Thornton's preseason doubters. With that caveat in mind, include me among the converted after Thornton posted his fifth shutout of the season in Chivas USA's 1-0 win in San Jose. “Zach has been a rock, but don't forget the guys in front of him,” coach of the year favorite Preki told reporters after the match. “If you see tonight, how many shots did he have to face? All 10 guys in front of him are doing a pretty good job. Obviously, he's been solid too, but credit to all of them. I don't like to separate players, it's all of them together.”
8. Los Angeles has scored seven goals this season. Landon Donovan has four goals and three assists, which means he has been involved in every Galaxy goal this season. That tally now includes Donovan's match-winning penalty kick – created by his fired cross into Seth Stammler's arm – in Saturday night's 1-0 victory over New York.
9. There wasn't much to take from a poor encounter between the Red Bulls and the Galaxy. Perhaps the best moment of the night came when veteran Los Angeles Times scribe Grahame L. Jones filed this opening line in his game story: “Juan Pablo Angel just might want to consider sending an e-mail David Beckham's way and asking how he coped with being a talented player on a struggling and dysfunctional team.”
10. “This team needs a spark,” New England striker Taylor Twellman said after he was named as a substitute for the first time this season as he continues his recovery from a neck injury. “I think I can give these guys a spark. That's why it's killing me. I was on the bench today and warming up. I was trying to get these guys going. We don't look like the Revolution of old. We're soon going to be there.”
11. “We've won 2-0 on the road,” Kinnear said about facing the weakened Revolution. “I don't care who is out there for them. I know Steve (Nicol, New England coach) has them organized and ready to play. Any time you can win a game against them, you're happy. We're happy with this.”
BONUS: I spent some time discussing new FC Dallas defender Kyle Davies' deflated trade value last week. I noted that RSL didn't have roster room for him with Fabian Espindola's impending arrival, but a source out in Salt Lake City reminded me late last week that there was more to the deal than just Davies' roster spot. Davies signed a five-year guaranteed deal worth an initial $80,000 with raises each subsequent year, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.
It didn't make any sense for RSL to keep Davies around at that cap number when he would take time to develop and wouldn't crack the starting lineup for at least year. The high cap number, his initial slot on the depth chart and Espindola's impending arrival all factored into the decision to trade him for a second-round draft pick. At that cap number, a second-round pick looks like reasonable compensation from this vantage point.
Kyle McCarthy writes the Monday MLS Breakdown and frequently writes opinion pieces during the week for Goal.com. He also covers the New England Revolution for the Boston Herald and MLSnet.com. Contact him with your questions or comments at kyle.mccarthy@goal.com and follow him on Twitter by clicking here.
From the moment Dwayne De Rosario hopped on the plane to Toronto this offseason, Stuart Holden's world changed.
No longer would Holden plug holes or shift from position to position. With De Rosario out of the picture, Holden nestled into a permanent home in central midfield and inherited the duty of driving the Dynamo offense.
“The reins, in a way, have been handed to me,” Holden said after the Dynamo dispatched New England 2-0 yesterday afternoon. “My hard work and my determination over the past few years have earned me this chance. Now that it's been given to me, I'm looking forward to taking it. I don't want to prove Dom wrong. I want to go out and do my best and help this team win.”
Dom – that's Houston head coach Dominic Kinnear to you and me, winner of two MLS Cups as a coach and 54 caps for the United States as a player – thinks the 23-year-old midfielder can fill De Rosario's ample, two-time MLS Cup MVP-winning boots. His teammates expect him to fulfill the promise of three starts and a game-winning goal at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and a call-up to U.S. national team camp this January.
No pressure, right?
“You do (feel it) and you don't,” Holden said. “I look at it as I'm going out to play soccer. At the end of the day, that's what I do best. That's what I came to do. When people look at it, Dwayne's gone. Dwayne was a big part of our team with the two championships, but it's not like I'm a newcomer to this team. I've been here for four years. I'm ready to step up and be a big player for this team.”
Big players produce week-in and week-out. Holden's role, at least for the moment, isn't as pronounced as De Rosario's once was. In Sunday's match against New England, Holden helped to orchestrate the tempo, but didn't find himself at the sharp end often enough despite his willingness to put himself about and make himself an option.
Holden did influence the match in a big way by cashing in on the lottery as his hopeful dribbler of a shot squeezed through the legs of returning Revolution goalkeeper Matt Reis.
“If you don't shoot, you don't score,” Holden said. “I've been holding back a little bit and maybe looking to pass too much. So I took a couple of shots today and I got lucky.”
Luck helped Holden notch his first goal of the season in his sixth match of the campaign. Holden will need to add to the one goal and two assists so far this season to replace the 24 goals and 11 assists De Rosario tallied in his three Dynamo seasons. For a Dynamo team that has rotated through second strikers since moving to Houston, De Rosario's goals always seemed to crop up at the right time to push Houston through.
Inheriting some of that goalscoring burden comes with the territory. Holden brings more two-way play to his version of De Rosario's role, but he also realizes that the Dynamo will need more goals from him even if his buildup play links to and creates for others.
“People look at the stats,” Holden said. “I look at the performance week-in, week-out. I think I've been helping the team and contributing. It was nice to get on the score sheet (today). Hopefully, that will give me a little bit of momentum and a little bit of confidence. I'll keep shooting and hopefully I'll score a few more goals.”
Holden also has to forge a more permanent relationship with central midfield partner Ricardo Clark after appearing alongside him occasionally over the past three seasons. The duo will take some time to develop the chemistry Clark and De Rosario enjoyed, but Holden likes how the partnership is progressing.
“I think we're forming a good tandem in there,” Holden said. “The more we play together, the more we get used to each other. The more we get to know each other, the better we can be as a team. We have a strong midfield and a good team. When things are clicking, we can be a tough team to beat.”
Things haven't clicked particularly well for the Dynamo so far this season. A pulsating 3-2 loss in San Jose showed how potent the Dynamo could be going forward, but defense struggles have alternated with offensive outages – the Dynamo entered Sunday's contest with one goal in its previous three matches – to mire Houston in the middle of the Western Conference pack.
Expectations are far higher than that for the perennial title contenders, even after the Dynamo shook off a 2-5-1 start last season to win the Western Conference regular season crown. Things are looking up after a much-needed victory over Colorado – rescued by a late penalty save by Pat Onstad – and a helpful bye week.
The momentum continued with a rather straightforward victory over the injury-ravaged Revolution. Houston produced its most complete game of the season with the back line rarely troubled and the attack creating numerous chances.
Kinnear said the buzz surrounding his team's slow start didn't accurately reflect the on-field performance.
“We were playing well early in the season,” Kinnear said. “I'm not saying that our troubles are over. We haven't played a perfect game and it's a long season. It's weird when people were starting to think that something was wrong. I don't think anything was wrong. Sometimes, our attack was good and our defense wasn't as good as our attack. Sometimes, it was the other way around.”
Sometimes, everything clicks together. For Holden and the Dynamo, there need to be more days like these as the season progresses. At least if the Dynamo wants to forget the long-locked fellow now plying his trade north of the border.
The final word on “Jersey-gate”
The transformation of Jair Marrufo's informal one-match suspension into a formal two-match ban drew to a close a rather unseemly affair stemming from a jersey exchange between the referee and Chicago star Cuauhtemoc Blanco after last weekend's 2-2 draw between Chicago and Columbus.
U.S. Soccer had no choice but to ban Marrufo. Referees cannot accept gifts, even from family friends. Under the glaring spotlight and the media scrutiny created by last weekend's events, U.S. Soccer could not afford to cut Marrufo a break. Banning or disciplining Blanco appeared a bridge too far, broken guidelines and churlish behavior aside.
I whacked Columbus around a bit in last Wednesday's column for placing too much emphasis on the incident. In hindsight, I wielded too broad of a brush when more subtlety was required. The Crew had to react to the situation at hand and do everything in its power to try to ensure Gino Padula's availability for this weekend's game in Toronto. The emphasis placed upon the supposed gravity of the situation and the tenuous links drawn between Padula's highly suspect red card and Blanco's gift still don't mesh in my mind, but it's tough to blame the Crew for doing what they could do to alert the league to a difficult situation.
Week Seven – Questions, Thoughts, and Answers
Monday MLS Breakdown Player of the Week – Jaime Moreno, FW, D.C. United
Even though his 35-year-old legs are fading, Moreno's class still remains. The veteran Bolivian striker struck twice to give United a 2-1 win over FC Dallas. A delicate and difficult trap on his left foot set up his right-footed finish – aided by some poor goalkeeping by Ray Burse – for the equalizer. There was no doubt about the quality of the second finish, a sumptuous chip over the onrushing Burse to seal all three points. Displays like this only serve as a reminder to how truly outstanding Moreno can be on his day.
“Every year he comes back, people doubt him,” United midfielder Ben Olsen told the Washington Post about Moreno's performance. “I tell people every time, 'Do not doubt this guy. He's going to keep doing what he's doing.' It was a classy performance once again from him.”
What was he thinking? Nick Garcia and Joe Cannon, DF and GK, San Jose
Maybe Garcia and Cannon were still thinking about the nasty clash that drove Chris Leitch from the field. Maybe they were just out to lunch. Maybe they just didn't react as well as they should have.
Possible explanations aside, the veteran pair let a looping Jonathan Bornstein cross bounce inside the six-yard box, a cardinal sin in defensive circles. Chivas USA striker Justin Braun nipped in between the reluctant duo and poked home the winner to settle a rather drab 1-0 affair at Buck Shaw Stadium.
“There was just a hesitation on both our parts, and it's just unfortunate,” Cannon told the San Jose Mercury News. “But what do you do? You hope that it gets cleaned out some way or another. Being that it was in the air so long, Nick probably felt I was definitely coming, and me being the goalie and losing sight of it, I felt Nick was coming for it.”
Eleven observations to start the week
1. Columbus head coach Robert Warzycha surprisingly withdrew Guillermo Barros Schelotto in the 61st minute in Toronto while the Crew were holding a 1-0 lead. Warzycha told reporters after the game that he withdrew Barros Schelotto for two reasons: to save the Argentine playmaker's legs from the BMO Field turf and to prevent a second booking after he had picked up one in the first half.
2. One wonders whether Robbie Rogers would have had the need to utter this quote if the veteran Argentine schemer had played the full 90 minutes. “We need to manage the game at the end a little better,” Rogers told reporters after the match. “We were trying to connect passes and the ball was getting lost and they would counterattack, especially after we scored. ... Sometimes I think we're a little naive and give up the ball way too easily. That's something we need to work on.” Columbus has conceded nine of its 12 goals in the second half, so I'd say finishing out games may not be a strong suit at this
point.
3. “You'd think that the center of your defense should be the strongest,” FC Dallas coach Schellas Hyndman said after his team lost 2-1 at D.C. United. “But both of their goals came through there. That's disappointing.”
4. League officials should take a careful look at the elbow Fredy Montero landed square on Gonzalo Segares' kisser. Referee Jasen Anno rightly sent the Colombian striker from the field. Given the fact that the contact didn't look particularly incidental from this point view, it could merit a further match or two. Then again, that suspension would be tough to take for Seattle considering the inconsistent manner in which MLS referees deal with flying elbows.
5. Even with that point granted, it is a tad bit rich to see the notoriously hard Segares moaning about taking an elbow from Montero and a kick from former teammate Nate Jaqua that left him with a swollen calf. “Lately everybody is trying to hit me,” Segares told the Chicago Tribune. “I don't know why. Maybe they're paying me back for when I used to be one of those guys that would kick people.”
6. Real Salt Lake lost Nick Rimando to a hand injury in the 35th minute of its 2-0 loss in Colorado. Rimando suffered a deep cut on his left middle finger in a collision with Conor Casey. Rimando told the Salt Lake Tribune that he expected to miss two to three weeks because of the injury. Persistent MLS trade target and RSL backup 'keeper Chris Seitz spent the weekend on loan in Portland and will be expected to step in for Wednesday's match at home to Los Angeles.
7. Count me among Zach Thornton's preseason doubters. With that caveat in mind, include me among the converted after Thornton posted his fifth shutout of the season in Chivas USA's 1-0 win in San Jose. “Zach has been a rock, but don't forget the guys in front of him,” coach of the year favorite Preki told reporters after the match. “If you see tonight, how many shots did he have to face? All 10 guys in front of him are doing a pretty good job. Obviously, he's been solid too, but credit to all of them. I don't like to separate players, it's all of them together.”
8. Los Angeles has scored seven goals this season. Landon Donovan has four goals and three assists, which means he has been involved in every Galaxy goal this season. That tally now includes Donovan's match-winning penalty kick – created by his fired cross into Seth Stammler's arm – in Saturday night's 1-0 victory over New York.
9. There wasn't much to take from a poor encounter between the Red Bulls and the Galaxy. Perhaps the best moment of the night came when veteran Los Angeles Times scribe Grahame L. Jones filed this opening line in his game story: “Juan Pablo Angel just might want to consider sending an e-mail David Beckham's way and asking how he coped with being a talented player on a struggling and dysfunctional team.”
10. “This team needs a spark,” New England striker Taylor Twellman said after he was named as a substitute for the first time this season as he continues his recovery from a neck injury. “I think I can give these guys a spark. That's why it's killing me. I was on the bench today and warming up. I was trying to get these guys going. We don't look like the Revolution of old. We're soon going to be there.”
11. “We've won 2-0 on the road,” Kinnear said about facing the weakened Revolution. “I don't care who is out there for them. I know Steve (Nicol, New England coach) has them organized and ready to play. Any time you can win a game against them, you're happy. We're happy with this.”
BONUS: I spent some time discussing new FC Dallas defender Kyle Davies' deflated trade value last week. I noted that RSL didn't have roster room for him with Fabian Espindola's impending arrival, but a source out in Salt Lake City reminded me late last week that there was more to the deal than just Davies' roster spot. Davies signed a five-year guaranteed deal worth an initial $80,000 with raises each subsequent year, according to the Salt Lake Tribune.
It didn't make any sense for RSL to keep Davies around at that cap number when he would take time to develop and wouldn't crack the starting lineup for at least year. The high cap number, his initial slot on the depth chart and Espindola's impending arrival all factored into the decision to trade him for a second-round draft pick. At that cap number, a second-round pick looks like reasonable compensation from this vantage point.
Kyle McCarthy writes the Monday MLS Breakdown and frequently writes opinion pieces during the week for Goal.com. He also covers the New England Revolution for the Boston Herald and MLSnet.com. Contact him with your questions or comments at kyle.mccarthy@goal.com and follow him on Twitter by clicking here.
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