Sorry for the delay….

PowerSwerve (red) beat adiPure (green)  2-0 in the late game of the second day of the 2009 combine.  Both goals were scored by Quincy Amarikwa in the second half.

1st half (green):

G: Alec Dufty (Evansville)

D: Wes Knight (College of Charleston), Michael Holody (Michigan), Darrius Barnes (Duke), Jack Traynor (Notre Dame)

M: Daniel Cruz (GA/UNLV), Paul Nicholson (Rio Grande), Jean Alexandre (Lynn), Raphael Cox (Washington)

F: Kwame Adjeman-Pamboe (George Mason), Graciano Brito (Quinnipiac)

2nd half (green):

G: Neal Kitson (SJU)

D: Wes Knight (College of Charleston), Darrius Barnes (Duke), Matt Besler (Notre Dame), Jack Traynor (Notre Dame)

M: Juan Guerra (FIU), Jokul Elisabetarson (UNCG), Aaron Clapham (Louisville), Jeremy Hall (GA/MD)

F: Jordan Seabrook (USF), Kwame Adjeman-Pamboe (George Mason)

1st half (Red):
GK: Evan Bush (GA/Cal)
D:  Lyle Adams (WF), Yohance Marshall (USF), Omar Gonzalez (GA/MD), Oscar Castillo (UConn),
M: Nick Zimmerman (JMU), Pat Murray (Furman), Akeem Priestley (UConn), Jeff Harwell (SMU)
F: Doug DeMartin (MSU), Steve Zakuani (GA/Akron)

2nd half (Red):
GK: Evan Bush (GA/Cal)
D: Ryan Mirsky (SMU), Yohance Marshall (USF), Omar Gonzalez (GA/MD), Oscar Castillo (UConn)
M: Nick Zimmerman (JMU), Sam Cronin (WF), Pat Murray (Furman) , Keum Sung Kim (Loyola-Illinois),
F: Bryan Irwin (Portland), Quincy Amarikwa (UC-Davis)

ASSESSMENT

In italics are the previous game commments and assessment classification.

Who had a good game (or played better than I expected)?

  • Knight (green) – terrific getting forward; touch was above average; beaten by Amarikwa for first goal; from 1/10/09 (+): showed well; confident out of the back; good passing/tackling;
  • Clapham (green) – tremendous; dominated the middle in the second half that enabled green to control much of the second half (now if one of the forwards could finish); from 1/10/09 (adequate): nervous early; good dribbling move to beat Lahoud and open up the middle – weak shot, wide left;
  • Traynor (green) – better; attacking the line, making nice crosses – Alexandre misses the shot; from 1/10/09 (adequate): good tackling and dribbling; treading water (e.g., not really improving his standing);
  • Besler (green) - aided in the attack, brilliant pass around Kim to ND team mate Traynor out on the wing to set up a good chance; got forward with a good run has adequate foot skills; from 1/10/09 (no opinion):
  • Cronin (red) – the most polished player at the combine; good tackle; timing;  from 1/10/09 (+): solid, solid, solid, giving away too much space in the first half along with his “defensive” midfielder Priestly. stock moving up;
  • Zimmerman (red) - dangerous in the box; nice touch; big body; made a bone-crunching vicious tackle on Wes Knight; this year’s Geoff Cameron? maybe; from 1/10/09 (+): made a neat move on Wallace, pulling the ball back to draw Wallace in before putting it past him to attack from the sideline across the top of the box and hitting a good left foot strike; another weird play was his attempted throw in that slipped out of his hands and touched a red player; everyone stopped and he recovered the ball and dribbled past 2 and picked up a free kick right outside the box;
  • Amarikwa (red) – scored 2 goals in the second half; neither goal was great; his first goal showed his confidence to dribble in the box with 2 defenders (Barnes/Knight) covering; seemed to be covered pretty well, but the shot squirted in (may have been a deflection).  The second goal was a disaster for Kitson from a Cronin corner kick that Amarikwa may have got a foot on to tip the ball in from 3 yards.  I don’t think he has MLS quality; from 1/10/09 (-): trying to hard; tons of speed; willing to be assertive; may not have enough talent – a player that deserves more attention.

Who was adequate?

  • Elisabetarson (green) – couple of nice tackles – not too impressive; looked slow running next to Zakuani;  from 1/10/09 (+): creative; nice passing; hard tackling
  • Adjeman-Pamboe (green) – brilliant move on Adams; runs very well; tactically immature; touch raw; from 1/10/09 (adequate): dangerous opportunity driving the ball to the end line before crossing it back to the Seabrook in the box;
  • Barnes (green) – good in air; part of the tandem that lost Amarikwa on the dribble; potential; from 1/10/09 (adequate): good defensive anticipation; showed well wide and centrally; long throw started an attack;
  • Cruz (green) – adequate – not setting himself apart from the crowd; powerful shot; from 1/10/09 (-): horrible game; passing, dribbling and even his dive in the box was amateurish;
  • Brito (green) – didn’t finish in the first half; ran well off the ball; from 1/10/09 (-): clumsy – showed his front-end speed; not good enough on the ball; played much better against Loyola this season; nerves – perhaps.
  • Holody (green) – team played better defense with Holody in the game;  from 1/10/09 (-): slower than I thought; allowed the ball to enter his box that Perara could not convert;
  • Guerra (green) – advanced the ball effectively to setup attacks (that died on the attackers feet; from 1/10/09 (-): good dribbler; doesn’t defend well enough to play wide midfield;
  • Castillo (red) – regressed with poor timing on his tackling; from 1/10/09 (+): overlapping, demonstrating his speed out of the back,  making sticking tackles; 2nd half – played worse;
  • Gonzalez (red) – better getting around; for those surprised that he is ploddingly – no kidding; needs to read the game quicker; what I expected; from 1/10/09 (adequate): 2nd half only, winning head balls – but not adding enough to transition;
  • Harwell (red) – started but suffered a knee injury on ball-to-ball contact; in his limited time had a good pass getting aroung the corner and a weak free kick that rolled to the keeper; from 1/10/09 (adequate): good shot off the dribble – active; need to watch more closely;
  • Zakuani (red) – burned down the side with Elisabetarson in his wake; got a slight window in the box with Knight battling to stay with him, but Zakuani hit a weak shot; hasn’t put his stamp on this combine; from 1/10/09 (adequate): quick; stealing the ball or going past his new butler (Russell); not able to pull the trigger when in the box; needs to relax;
  • DeMartin (red) – smart runs not able to beat a defender 1v1; from 1/10/09 (adequate): tries hard; not able to get around sufficiently; makes good runs;
  • Marshall (red) -better, though doesn’t look comfortable; good defensive positioning; from 1/10/09 (-): not controlling the middle, didn’t stop Pontius;

Who needs to improve?

  • Seabrook (green) – has to finish when given open shots; from 1/10/09 (+): finished his chance; sometimes that is all a forward needs to do; will need to step it up if he wants to get into the first round;
  • Alexandre (green) – brutal 1st touch; missed his shots; did have one shot that was struck well and on target; from 1/10/09 (adequate): aggressive hard tackler, reckless at times; technically weak; reminds me of Brandon McDonald; probably will have many suspensions;
  • Hall (green) – coasting; not finishing (had a swing and miss at a rolling ball.  Received a cross from Adjeman-Pamboe 15 yards from goal on the far post and tried to either pass or float a shot or heaven knows what – turned out to be a drunken quail that resulted in a goal kick;  from 1/10/09 (adequate): didn’t differentiate himself against the competition; needs to assert himself more; his central midfield is a black hole at times;
  • Cox (green) – blew a good opportunity by passing to the wing rather than the breaking Brito; beat Adams on the dribbling; very left foot centric; from 1/10/09 (-): small; bad game passing; needs to use his speed more to create space;
  • Nicholson (green) – much better – still not nearly enough, but was able to rise to mediocre; too many touches – needs to play quicker; from 1/10/09 (horrific): clueless, not nearly good enough;
  • Kitson (green) – let in both goals, but swatted away a Cronin corner kick that he should have caught or “punched” away; brutal goal kick; rotten performance – disaster; from 1/10/09 (no opinion):
  • Bush (red) – indecisive; from 1/10/09 (adequate): not blamed on either goal, but could have increased his ranking by stepping up and making the big save;
  • Adams (red) -beaten often and regularly; tried to get forward without adequate rotation; from 1/10/09 (adequate): getting forward; doing fine;
  • Priestley (red) -not creating enough; strong on the ball; but not making the critical pass to spring his forwards; from 1/10/09 (-): good on the ball but doesn’t play defense; as part of the central midfield duo that surrendered the middle of the field to blue
  • Irwin (red) – received a pass behind the defense but poor touch gave it to keeper; he’s lost;  from 1/10/09 (no opinion):

Who should consider a couple of days on the beach before starting a regular job?

  • Kim (red) - better, but wasn’t possible to be any worse; not MLS player; from 1/10/09 (horrific): Worse player out there; I’ve seen him twice this year and today was like they got some kid off the street; different player; he was dreadful; if this is your best, fake an injury.
  • Murray (red) – in 70 minutes, absolutely nothing productive;  from 1/10/09 (horrific): nothing redeeming in his half of play;

Who do I need to continue to observe/didn’t do enough today?

  • Dufty (green) – didn’t do anything noteworthy; no opinion; from 1/10/09 (no opinion):
  • Mirsky (red) – only played 2nd half as a right back – no observations; from 1/10/09 (-): not controlling the middle, didn’t stop Pontius;

Who didn’t play/missing?

  • Bernstein (red) – pulled hamstring on first day of practice;
  • Milligan (red) – according to my notes, he didn’t play – though he was scheduled to play in the first half; from 1/10/09 (no opinion):