Baltimore, MD -On a beautiful fall, sunny afternoon, Loyola beat Quinnipiac (Q) 5-4 in a wild game that had plenty of offense and loads of poor defense.
Q scored twice as many goals in 1 game as Loyola had conceded in the entire season. Coming back from a 4-1 deficit, Q fought back in a 15 minute stretch to tie the game before losing in the final minute. Applicable Sean Connery quote from the movie, The Rock, “Your best! Losers always whine about their best. Winners go home [with] the prom queen”.
Starting Lineups:
Quinnipiac 4-2-3-1.
G: Freddy Hall
D: Pierre Soubrier, Ryan Smith, Shane Recklet, Matthew Rothbart
DM: Johan Karlhagen, Fabricio Silva
M: Dominic Adams, Durval Pereira, Graciano Brito
F: Rodrigo Uchoa
Loyola 4-4-2.
G: Milos Kocic
D: Steven Bantock, Josh Taylor, Tennant McVea, Charlie Hutton
M: Glenn Leitch, Mike Deasel, Eddie Dines, Daniel Ankrah
F: Jamie Darvill, Phil Bannister
Quinnipiac observations:
Q dominated the first 15 minutes of the game. They were possessing the ball and looked very good technically all over the field. While I can see why they aren’t shutting out teams, I am unsure why they haven’t been winning by a larger margin. Their team defense (from the forwards back) play soft defense rarely winning the second ball. Additionally, Q doesn’t mark closely in the box. This is more of a desire, discipline and anticipation problem. Q has a dynamic attack with many fast, skillful players that can shoot very well. Given this, Q could win the NEC conference, but I doubt that they’ll do much in the NCAA – perhaps winning a game or 2 (but unlikely).
Senior forward (starts in a left midfielder position) Graciano Brito impressed me today more than he did on a wet pitch against Mount Saint Mary’s last year. He was much, much better. He likes to get the ball on the left, sometimes with a defender in front of him, using his speed to cut across the pitch and shoot with his right foot. He is big, strong and fast. I’d like to see him at the combine – he should do well because of his superior 1v1 skills. Combining with others may be more problematic for him in settling with a professional team.
On the first Q goal in the 30th minute, Brito dribbled the ball into the box and slotted the ball to the far post to reduce the Loyola lead 2-1 going into half time.
On Brito’s second goal to cut the Loyola lead to 4-3 in the 79th minute, right back sophomore Pierre Soubrier made a slicing pass to DM junior Fabricio Silva just inside the Q half. Silva with a single touch, turned, got his head up and located Brito breaking. Silva’s next touch found Brito in stride 35 yards from goal. Brita took 1 touch to get close to the box before slotting a ball past Loyola junior GK Milos Kocic. Loyola’s DM Mike Deasel did not close quick enough on Silva to prevent the open pass.
The second Q goal was scored an own goal, but I thought that sophomore DM Johan Karlhagen had touched the Dwayne Mars corner kick. If Karlhagen didn’t touch it in, then Loyola senior central defender captain Josh Taylor did score the goal against his team in the 75th minute.
In the 89th minute Q tied the score at 4 apiece on a tremendous cross by sophomore right midfielder Dwayne Mars that found a wide open freshman midfielder Durval Pereira’s head from 6 yards that was buried with a powerful header. Loyola defenders where were you? Kocic wants to know, too.
Sophomore forward Rodrigo Uchoa is a big target player with good foot skills but lacks the work rate to play up top without another forward. He’s too whiny for my tastes.
Last year, junior goal keeper Freddy Hall was impressive and his stats were exemplary. However, against Loyola his poor positioning was exposed as a liability. He sits back too far hoping to use his superior athleticism to stop shots. As he faces better players, this will be insufficient, because these players will be able to put the ball where Hall can’t get the ball.
Junior central defender Shane Recklet tackles well and distributes from the back. His passing is sharp and his tackling hard. For example, in the 36th minute, he won possession, took a good first touch, assessed the field, then distributed keeping possession for Q. On the first touch, I’ve seen too many defenders relieve pressure temporarily by clearing the ball without maintaining possession.
Senior central defender Ryan Smith is good in the air.
The outside backs were beaten like old nags (horses not older women) all day. Neither, freshman Matthew Rothbart nor sophomore Pierre Soubrier, is a good defender. Both have limited technical skills, but the defensive deficiencies are insurmountable.
Most of the defensive problems can be attributed to the lack of bite by the Q defensive midfield (Karlhagen and Silva) allowing Loyola too much space to work – though the midfielders and forwards weren’t pressing up top effectively either.
Loyola observations:
Something is not right with junior goal keeper Milos Kocic. This was the worse game that I’ve seen him play (I wrote this at HT – and it still holds after the game). While he had some good moments in the second half making several diving stops and a critical tip, he is not the same player that he was earlier this year and last year. At HT, I commented that his best soccer attribute is his Serbian accent – i.e., at least he sounds like he might have an idea how to play. In retrospect, I think he may be suffering a minor leg or abdominal injury – something is wrong. Truthfully, I had a dream last night that he signed with a European side and he left Loyola immediately. The pending signing was on his mind affecting his play. Perhaps for Loyola fans, I should have said nightmare.
In the 19th minute, sophomore left back Charlie Hutton served a long pass from the back to junior forward Jamie Darvill who got all of it on the shot for the opening goal.
Seven minutes later, sophomore right back Steven Bantock got the ball into the corner for sophomore right midfielder Glenn Leitch. Leitch took the ball to the end line and crossed it back to the top of the box that sophomore Eddie Dines struck with power into the left side netting to extend the lead to 2-0 at that time.
Sophomore seems to be repetitive because Loyola started 7 sophomores!
In the 60th minute, Loyola extended the lead to 3-1. Senior central defender Josh Taylor mis-hit a ball sending it high into the air from midfield. Sophomore forward Phil Bannister with pressure on his back turned on Uchoa sending in a cross to a breaking wide-open Darvill in the middle of the box for his second goal of the day.
The fourth goal was started by Steven Bantock with a long pass into the corner to Bannister. Q’s Ryan Smith momentarily stole the ball before Bannister stole it back. From a sharp angle, Bannister got on the scoreboard slotting the ball into the goal with Q GK Freddy Hall doing his best traffic cone impression.
Sophomore forward Phil Bannister doesn’t look as dangerous (even with 1g, 1a) as he recovers from his ACL injury that he suffered earlier this year. He isn’t moving as fluidly.
The final score was set-up again by Bannister with less than a minute to play. He was trundled by a Q defender (I believe that it was Soubrier) right outside the box to the angst of the fan-side referee helpers and the fan-side unofficial assistant coaches. Darvill shot around the wall trying to get the game winner and the hat trick. It was blocked by Recklet and landed at freshman forward Mark Jaskolski’s foot and he hit the game winner with 30 seconds remaining.
Deasel was not slowing down the Q transition sufficiently. Q was dribbling through “his” middle without paying for it. He needs to answer for that. His only response was body-slamming John Karlsberg in the 58th minute – dumb. I don’t mind the yellow, but Deasel should have been awarded a red card. Besides, Karlsberg wasn’t hurting Loyola – foul Brito who was disassembling the Loyola defense.
Key AM Eddie Dines was substituted with less than a minute remaining in the first half. He did not return. Can Loyola handle another injury to a key player? With Dines missing, Leitch was pushed centrally and was not helping Deasel later in the second half.
Sophomore sub Wade McHugh looks over his head.
Leitch had a terrific dribble splitting Rothbart and Silva to gain entry into the box and but for a terrific save by Hall a goal was inevitable.
I like coach Mark Mettrick and I believe he does a good job. However, I don’t think he sufficiently prepared his team to stop Brito from breaking down the defense. An undefeated season is special and should be preserved with every resource.
