Hot Night Saps Rapids Attack

Before we get into the review of Saturday night's game a quick roster update.  Today Colorado officially transferred Marko Ilic to Red Star Belgrade.  Terms of the deal were not announced but Burgundy Wave does not expect any fee that might have been paid to equal what we paid for him a year ago.  Thus ends one of the worst transfers in Rapids history.

On to Saturday night and a haphazard game where neither team could get into rhythm.  Fair play to RBNY, part of that was due to their high line, but it was also a off-night for the Rapids.  The 1-1 draw was probably fair, maybe a bit generous to New York, but in the end there's not much for Colorado to complain about.

I wanted to do a breakdown of the Red Bull goal.  Here's the setup at the moment the secondary assist pass is released:

Rosenberry on the right of our back line has just stepped out to track the overlapping RBNY player behind the ball.  Ronan is on Harper but giving him enough room to get the pass in.  As Rosenberry steps out Harper finds the space to play Vanzeir through.  Despite that we're still in good shape with Abubakar, Maxso, and Vines all available to cover and only two other threats beyond Vanzeir.

When Vanzeir controls the ball and plays it back to Morgan our defense is set up like this:

Abubakar has done the right thing, collapsing back on Vanzeir to cut off the shot and pressure him.  Rosemberry is trying to recover from being fooled and add some more pressure.  Maxso though got caught sleeping and didn't step to Morgan.  That leaves him free to receive the pass and one-time the shot.  Also Vines is completely marking space with the other RBNY attacker all alone on the left flank.

Now this was a bang-bang play, I'm not sure Maxso gets there in time to stop the goal anyway.  But leaving Morgan that open made it easy for them.  On a final note this counter came off a poor punt from Steffen that RBNY immediately recycled back into the attacking third.

The Rapids pushed back hard in the second half and got the goal they deserved, even if it was an own goal.  They were more dangerous late in the game too but were just sloppy enough that they couldn't convert.

Man of the Match: Zack Steffen.  Despite the poor punt that led to the RBNY goal Steffen still had a really good game and kept us in it, particularly in the first half.