Oakland Roots 0-1 Orange County Soccer Club

 

Oakland’s principal offensive limitation, which I think is pretty widely known at this point, is in the air. With the occasional exception of Jeremy Bokila, Oakland’s forwards and wingers are simply not proficient in the air. They’ve compensated by playing through the half spaces and up the middle. Rather than rely on their fullbacks to generate chances, Oakland’s offensive engine in its current preferred shape is whoever is occupying the two central midfield roles. If all is well, that is Wal Fall and Jose Hernandez. Oakland tends to use the wide areas to facilitate movement through the channels, rather than as spaces for overlapping runs or dribbles. This is not to say that you never see that kind of progressive movement up the flank, nor is it to say that Oakland never plays over the top. But it is to say that these are not the centerpiece of Oakland’s attack. Roots want to play back-to-front, and to keep the ball on the floor while doing so.

Orange County were prepared for just that. OCSC kept both their midfield and their backline compact, and essentially ignored Oakland’s fullbacks in the buildup. Here’s a shot from an early Oakland attack:

I've circled Takahashi and Diaz. You can see that, in this instance, OCSC is defending essentially in 2 banks of 4, with one forward pressing the ball, and Ronaldo Damus ready to spring a counter. Both Takahashi and Diaz are allowed to roam free down the side of the field, the bet apparently being that if they get the ball in the corner, Oakland are toast. Orange County left back Nathan Smith isn't ignoring Diaz, but there's no urgency to close down his space at all. And, in fact, the end result of this play was an off target ball over the top to a wide open Memo Diaz.

Here's another example, from the 13th minute:

Diaz is in a less threatening area here, but there are 9 OCSC players in this shot, and 0 are monitoring the movement of Diaz or Takahashi. OCSC is essentially playing 9 on 6 here. 

I think this is a bet that Oakland cannot punish you in the air, so crosses in from the wide areas are not cause for concern. And this was particularly devastating to Oakland as OCSC’s compact structure clogged the channels Roots typically funnel their offense through. OCSC was also incredibly disciplined in dealing with Lindo Mfeka. He operated as a false 9, and honestly some of his movement might have been too extreme, but, regardless, OCSC refused to let their backline be pulled out of shape.

The result, for Oakland in attack at least, is something that plagued them during the goal drought earlier this season--a handful of chances, but at a low enough volume that you need either luck or top-drawer clinicality to get on the scoreboard. And Roots were anything but clinical in this match. The number of misplaced passes that took place in their defensive half was bad enough, but a few counters fizzled out for the same reason, as well. Their passing, like Lindo Mfeka's kit, was just a little off in this one:

For OCSC’s part, they did what any team that is essentially parking a bus would do--they sent it long to Ronaldo Damus, who, it turns out, is faster than both Kai Greene and Emrah Klimenta. OCSC’s decision to sit back also sucked Matias Fissore up into attack, meaning the backline was left without cover on occasion. In fact, here’s the hockey assist for OCSC’s goal. 6 of Roots’ 10 outfield players are in the attacking half:

We don’t get to see what exactly happened between Greene and Klimenta, but the aftermath suggests that somehow both misplayed this ball. And then Takahashi was in the right position to deal with what turned into a cross, but appeared not to sense Ben Mines right behind him.

Oakland adjusted in attack by having Ariel Mbumba fill the wide space down the left. This was movement OCSC had to respect because Mbumba has proven capable of carrying the ball into the box on his own. This strategy might eventually have paid dividends, but it was upended by Lindo Mfeka’s injury around the 40th minute. This is tough to see. It looked like a non-contact groin injury, and it may well be the last we see of Mfeka this year. Even if it isn’t severe, 2 weeks is not an unreasonable time frame for return, and there are only 2 weeks left.

Oakland brought on Bokila, and started launching balls over the top, which worked well enough, but Bokila was on the pitch for about 12 minutes of game time before Jose Hernandez earned his red card.

Down a man, Oakland shifted to a back 3. You could see that this is a team that wants the postseason. But their play was more frantic than urgent, and, as you would expect, they were pretty constantly chasing OCSC around the pitch. They earned a series of free kicks in the last 10 minutes, but couldn’t put anything on target.

Now this all sounds pretty bad, but let’s keep some perspective: This was a 1-0 loss, and Oakland had a Paul Blanchette (!) header cleared off the line in the game’s waning moments. So how did Oakland keep it so close? They controlled possession for much of the match, and, as we have noted many times before, Greene and Klimenta are fantastic 1-v-1 defenders in the box. It also didn’t hurt that Dillon Powers’ penalty run-up fooled even his own team, causing Eric Calvillo to run right in front of the referee before Powers took his shot. Nor did it hurt that Calvillo kept aiming at the crossbar rather than the back of the net.

At the same time, match number 29 is not the time for moral victories. This one stings. It looked briefly like this result would not do too much damage to Oakland's playoff chances, as in the early game on Sunday Sacramento and Tacoma drew. But it's the hope that kills you, obviously: The Two went out and put a 5-0 (!) beating on El Paso Locomotive in the late game on Sunday, stretching their lead in the standings over Oakland to 5 points, with three matches to play. 

Roots will play at least one more match with playoff implications, and Los Angeles's form right now is like me after I've had too much coffee: all over the place. In their last five they have a 3-goal win over Phoenix and a 5-goal win over El Paso (possibly the best pair of results in all of USL), while at the same time losing by 3 to San Diego and drawing Sacramento. They go away to Charleston battery on Wednesday, which is hopefully not a recipe for success. Pacific Division teams have not won any matches in the eastern time zone this year; OCSC earned a draw in their away match to Charleston in August. It isn't much, but there's cause for hope. What there isn't right now, though, is goals. Roots will need to sort that out (and without Hernandez or Mfeka) if they want to stay alive.