Washington, DC – On a beautiful spring afternoon, Wake Forest beat Maryland 3-1 in a preliminary match before the main event New England Revolution vs. DC United at RFK Stadium.
New England’s coach, Steve Nichols has used WF as his personal farm team drafting or acquiring Michael Parkhurst, Wells Thompson, Pat Phelan, James Riley, Ryan Solle, Jeremiah White, etc.
DCU has tapped the talent pool from Maryland, as well, with the following players playing for DCU in the past few years, Rodney Wallace, Marc Burch, Dom Mediate, Kenny Bertz, Leo Cullen amongst others.
Maryland wore pink uniforms as part of their Kicks Against Breast Cancer campaign. With those pink uniforms, Maryland reminded me of newborn white mice: helpless, blind and motionless. Wake in their black uniforms imitated a large black cat toying with the helpless mice before putting them out of their misery.
The match was over in the first 30 minutes with WF up 3-0. Both teams are mere shadows of their 2008 teams when MD won the national championship and WF was arguably the best team in the country.
MD has lost their entire starting defense and 3 of the 4 starting midfielders from 2008. WF lost key defenders and much of their midfield. Additionally, WF has lost the best defender in college, Ike Opara, to injury. WF is going to need to learn to play without Opara because he’ll be gone for at least a month in the fall preparing and playing for the U20 team in Egypt.
MD was simply awful in the back. WF is going to have problems if they don’t play better in the back, as well. WF is not holding the ball as well as they have in years past.
Just a reminder, player identification is sketchy in the spring, because players change numbers.
Starting Lineups:
WF 4-4-2 flat central midfield with Bone migrating centrally.
F: Zack Schilawski, Cody Arnoux
M: Luke Norman, Danny Wenzel (wearing #2), Kyle Adams, Corben Bone
D: Nick Courtney, Nick Millington, Justin Lichtfuss, Chris Estridge
G: Akira Fitzgerald
MD 4-4-2 with a diamond midfield.
F: Jason Herrick, Casey Townsend (wearing #11)
M: Drew Yates (wearing #10), Matt Kassel, Kaoru Forbess, Doug Rodkey
D: Kwame Darko, Sean Flatley, Kevin Tangney, Alex Lee
G: Zac MacMath
WF Observations:
While WF dominated a helpless MD defense, WF shouldn’t be too content with their play, because they are not even close to the team that they have had for the past couple of years. WF has a lot of work to do to get back to that level.
Kyle Adams started the scoring in the 3rd minute from a Corbin Bone corner kick. MD GK MacMath had an opportunity to punch the ball away but didn’t get much of it and Adams headed from 6 yards from the back post. MD cleared the ball off the line, but the AR said that it went in. From midfield, I can’t contest the call.
15 minutes later, Cody Arnoux was fouled by Kevin Tangney just past midfield when he was breaking behind the defense (probably a smart play). However, Bone served a pretty free kick that Arnoux headed from the near post 10 yards out to his strike partner, Zack Schilawski, left alone on the far post 6 yards from goal. Schilawski finished this gift with his head. 3 touches, Bone’s foot, Arnoux’s head, Schilawski’s head –> Goal.
These three are going to be involved in most of the WF goals in the fall.
The last goal was assisted by Schilawski driving down the left side crossing the ball on the ground past Tangney (who needed to do more than whiff on the cross) to an open Luke Norman from 5 yards in the 30th minute.
Arnoux is a sniper with accurate shots. He can shoot.
Kyle Adams’s passing needs to improve. He is not good on the ball.
I don’t think that Akira Fitzgerald is a quality GK. He doesn’t move well. I question his ability to cover high balls – for example, Herrick out-jumped Fitzgerald – Herrick is not that tall.
Danny Wenzel is cementing the central DM position.
Norman is good as the wide midfield.
Incoming freshman Ben Newnam is confident on the ball. He’s going to be a good one.
I don’t care for Nick Millington teaming with Wenzell.
Nick Courtney makes poor decisions. He may have the skills, but isn’t thinking clearly. For example, in the 67th minute, he had space with the ball coming to him, rather than calmly bringing the ball down with his chest and maintaining possession. He headed the ball back up the field giving the ball back to MD.
Arnoux is a MLS first round draft pick – he reminds me of Pontius last year.
MD Observations:
Kaoru Forbess impressed me with his ball skill. It’s something that I hadn’t seen in the fall. He played AM (another surprise for me) and was competent. He started the play that resulted in the lone MD goal. Forbess was one of the few bright spots on an otherwise lackluster MD performance.
Drew Yates (with a new number #10) played wide midfield. His dribbling is fun to watch. He’s not overly quick or fast, but he keeps the ball on a string, step overs, enable him to keep defenders off balance. Yates will never be questioned about going forward. However, getting back that is a different story.
Matt Kassel serves a sweet free kick, but he was unsuccessful stopping WF attacks through his middle. His shooting was erratic, too.
Matt Oduaran played the last 53 minutes. He has a body like Jozy Altidore, big and fast. Oduaran scored the goal from a long service by Forbess getting behind the WF defense. He pulled the ball back avoiding the retreating defenders, dragging the ball along the top of the box before slotting the ball into the lower corner.
Oduaran doesn’t have sufficient skill nor confidence on the ball in the box.
The MD defense was abysmal. They were in disarray for much of the first half. Flatley and Tangney have been in the program for several years. I don’t understand this confusion. Generally, MD was too soft in the back.
Tangney played horribly. Making a soft pass that WF was able to intercept forcing MacMath to make a point-blank save to save a goal. Tangney is better than he displayed at RFK.
Flatley has never impressed me (other than an emergency fill-in). He did nothing to change my opinion. On a free kick, he let Arnoux had too much space in the box. How could he permit one of Wake’s best snipers any space?
I never considered Kwame Darko more than a practice player or someone getting a few mop-up minutes. He’s fast but he just didn’t do anything that made me anxious to see more of him.
Alex Lee was rumored to be transferring to PSU to play with his twin brother. He was continuously exposed by Arnoux and Schilawski on the dribble.
Even MacMath, who I think may be the best freshman GK in the country, had a very shaky game. He kept dropping the ball. He has better hands that what I saw in this game. If MacMath has a bad year, MD is done in 2009. He is going to have a lot of pressure to save the weak MD defense.
Doug Rodkey is slick, making space for himself to serve in dangerous crosses. Rodkey can be a key contributor, but he is going to need others around him to do well.
Casey Townsend left late in the first half suffering a “leg injury”. He tried to warm up in the second half but running with a limp – I’m glad to see that he was shut down.
Townsend and Herrick have a lot of responsibility to score given the defense is like a sieve. Townsend seems to have grown a few inches.
MD may lose the alumni game on May 1.
