In a pivotal game with significant playoff implications and revised lineups for both teams, the Washington Spirit fell badly, 6-1, to the Portland Thorns. From being in playoff position for several weeks, after losing three straight Washington dropped to fifth, while Portland slipped past them to take fourth.
If at the end of the season the Spirit fail to make the playoffs, we might well be looking back at the 69:49 mark of this game. After giving up two goals early, DC had fought hard for the next hour, gotten one goal back, and looked the more likely team to get another. Then backup goalkeeper Chantel Jones muffed a backpass from Niki Cross, sending it right to Alex Morgan, who quickly settled the ball and chipped it over the Jones and into the net.
“The third goal was a killer,” said Spirit head coach Mark Parsons. “I thought we were going to get that second goal. When that third goal went in, we changed the shape, went to three at the back. Soon as we went three in the back, we lost our rhythm, and they looked more dangerous.”
The Thorns would score three goals in the final six minutes to turn a comfortable win into a blowout. Of course, if the Spirit don’t give up two goals early, it’s a different game, too.
The Spirit started a new back line with two new players, with, from left to right: Robyn Gayle, Niki Cross, Ali Krieger, and Alex Singer, with Cross and Singer playing their first matches for the team after arriving earlier in the week. The first goal came down to some problems between Krieger and Cross. Krieger sent a square ball over to Cross but put way too much pace on it, so Cross had to chase it down. Then her attempted clearance was deflected right to Alex Morgan at the near post. Morgan had some space but instead decided to send it to Christine Sinclair at the top of the box, who powered it off the upper left side of the crossbar and in.
In the 11th minute, Portland’s Sarah Huffman sent a free kick into the box that Jones tried to punch away but whiffed on as it curved away from her. It got slipped to Sinclair right on the line, but her shot was blocked. Morgan tried once and sent it off the post, a second shot was blocked and sent high in the air, then when it came down Morgan headed it into the net. “The first ten minutes is the craziest I’ve ever seen,” said Parsons, inspired in part by that sequence.
After that the home team seemed to settle down and were working hard to claw a goal back. In the 14th minute they almost had one, with Jodie Taylor getting a ball past Michelle Betos, but Sarah Huffman cleared it off the line. In the 35th minute, Taylor had another chance on a nice through ball from Lori Lindsey, but she shot it low and right to Betos.
The just-acquired Lisa De Vanna came in at the beginning of the second half and just missed scoring three minutes later, her slide not quite enough to put a rolling Lindsey cross on target.
At the other end, in the 52nd minute, Morgan chased down a ball outside the left post and sent it out for Vero Boquete, who just missed wide right.
The Spirit goal would finally come in the 62nd minute. Lindsey sent a ball to Diana Matheson deep on the right. Matheson crossed it back to Lindsey in the box, who kicked it out for Christine Nairn. Nairn’s first shot was blocked, but the rebound came right back to her. She brought it to the top of the box and fired it in low, and it managed to get under Betos and in.
Then came the 70th minute, and the pile-on began. The Spirit held on for a bit, but in the 85th minute the Thorns came in with Farrelly, Boquete, Sinclair and 82nd-minute sub. Farrelly sent it forward to Boquete at the top left corner of the box. Boquete looked for a shot but then crossed it to Sinclair. Sinclair slipped it to an onrushing Farrelly, who sent a shot in that Jones saved, but the rebound went right to McDonald, who fired it in with Jones on the ground.
Three minutes later, Huffman sent in a cross from the left that went through substitute defender Danesha Adams and came right to McDonald out from the right post, and she knocked it in for her second goal.
Finally, in stoppage time with the Spirit playing up, Allie Long sent a ball to Boquete on the left, who fed it back to her. Long managed to get around Cross and fire in an open shot into the right corner.
Despite the lopsided score, though, the Spirit didn’t seem that down. “We played really well,” said Jones. “At times we moved the ball really nicely. On the goal, that was probably the best buildup that we had the whole game. Just sometimes the ball doesn’t bounce the way you want it to. That’s all right. We’ll rebound next game. We have a really important game in Houston, and we’re going to be focusing on that all week.”
Parsons thought a lot of it was just a matter of not getting the breaks. Quoting one of the players, he said, “Everything that could have gone wrong in the box for us did. Everything that could have gone right for them did.”
He was also optimistic about the new acquisitions, again attributing the quote to someone else. “New players have come in, first game, and if they already look that good, imagine how they’ll be when they’ve trained with us.”
He said that a lot of the injured players are returning to health, and that he has some tough choices to face down the line. In particular, he’s hoping that Crystal Dunn will be available for Washington’s next match, at the Houston Dash on Saturday, June 28, at 9 pm EDT.
All I can say is watch the video of the first half and just watch Gayle. She would receive the ball, stand there for 5 seconds looking around, then pass the ball to whereever her teammates were not. Either she sent it to a Thorn or to empty space. I started to think she was trying to help Sinclair.
I do want to do that, but it’s not available yet, and I wanted to go ahead and do the post about the game. I may do a follow-up (“Five Things You Can Say About a 6-1 Loss”) if I see enough in the video to make it worthwhile.
I just rewatched the first half and didn’t see what you saw. In the first 40 minutes, she had one bad pass, one great pass (around the 32nd minute) and at some point an overenthusiastic ball over the top that was ahead of everyone. She also had a few nondescript little passes. In the next few minutes (40-43), she did have several poor passes right to the wrong team but again a couple of good ones. So I saw something of a lapse late in the first half but not the consistent deficiency that you saw. But she didn’t really have that many opportunities for a while there, either.
Why wasn’t Ashlyn in goal? I haven’t been able to find any mention of the reason she sat. I know she played for USWNT Thursday but she’s a keeper and not field player so fatigue shouldn’t be a big deal. And why was krieger pulled at half? Injury or just needed rest following recent spirit and WNT minutes?
She hurt her knee in the France game. It can’t have been too bad because she was still the sub, but apparently Parsons didn’t want to take any chances with her.
Gayle surprisingly poor in Thorns game. She’d been up and down all season, but that was shocking. She literally did everything in steps. You could see her thinking the process through. Receive ball and focus on trap, slowly read options, choose badly and fail to execute. It was painful to watch.
Spirit players made a lot of errant passes, too easily giving the ball away. Neither Taylor nor De Vanna could finish their chances, otherwise the Spirit could have had three more goals. Some of us at the game recognized at the time Kreiger was taken out that Parsons was making a big mistake going to only three backs. But, we do not feel better for that recognition. The loss as the article points out could have been a bad turning point for the Spirit’s season.
Krieger was hurting after the match enough that she declined to be interviewed. And I don’t think they went to three backs at that point – Huster just took Ali’s spot. It wasn’t until they were down 3-1 that Parsons went to the more attacking (but riskier) formation.
Meant to mention this in the other post. Really think pushing Nairn out wide essentially halves her potential impact. Of course when Yaya has compromising pics of Parsons and LL is too slow to play wide Nairn moves. So which middie sits for Garefrakes?