This was posted on the Stanford Womens team thread on bigsoccer. This goal by Stanford's Lindsay Taylor was absolutely ridiculous, in a good way. Have a look ~
I don't watch a lot of womens' soccer, but I have watched a fair number of games from college to the Women's World Cup and Olympics. This is the best goal I have ever seen scored in women's soccer, and that includes comparing this to some killer strikes by Michelle Akers in her prime. Frankly, it is one of the nicest goals I have ever seen in ANY soccer.
Others have commented on LT's nice footwork before striking the ball. And of course, they are right, it was world class.
I am even more impressed by the strike itself, though. If you look closely at the video, you'll see (though not very well due to the distance and angle of the video) that she not only got tons of power on the ball, but it had a monster swerve as well. She "bent it like Beckham" right into the upper 90 from absolutely downtown. The 'keeper, who correctly was sliding over to her right post as LT was winding up to shoot, still had absolutely NO CHANCE despite cheating over as far as she did. A sublime strike, as nice as you will see anywhere in soccer at any level.
This goal reminds me a lot of the one Preki, playing for the USA Mens National Team used to beat mighty Brazil in the '98 Gold Cup. Preki put a similar move on his defender and then unleashes a swerving, dipping cannon-shot that the flying Taffarel could not touch. The swerve on LT's ball looked similar to what Preki put on his, though Preki's had a little more of a screwball-like dip.
Here is a video of Preki's goal. This is a longer version than what I posted on bigsoccer, and it shows Preki's shot from more than one angle.
The reverse angle shows the swerve/dip very nicely. LT hit a very similar ball, and from further out. Incredible.
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Title Tilt: Stanford's Keys to the UCLA Match
The national college soccer polls, ranking Stanford ahead of UCLA, are a synthesis of opinion. So what?
Stanford will need to be at their best to beat UCLA on the road.
UCLA will likely try to clog the middle with a high-pressure 3-5-2 or maybe even a 3-6-1 formation. The objective will be to force Stanford to bypass their midfield with long balls out of the back. UCLA can defend those long balls all day long and would look for the quick counter, having nullified Stanford's speed and tactical acumen.
Thus, Stanford will need to stay patient, play their game, and use their skill and creativity to unlock the UCLA defense. It may take most of the first hour or more to do it, but do it they can. Simply put, if Stanford gives up and resorts to bootball to overcome UCLA's inevitable midfield pressure they will not win this match.
Stanford will need to use speed and incisive runs on the flanks to stretch the field horizontally. They need their strikers and a-mids to *run at people*. They need to make UCLA foul in their defensive third. Sanford will need to make *judicious* use of long balls and through-balls up the middle from the midfield to stretch the field vertically, serving balls for O'Hara to run onto to terrorize the UCLA backline. The emphasis is of course on the word "judicious", since Stanford's main attack strategy will need to be playing the feet of ther strikers and a-mids and having them run at people, lay off precision passes, and shoot, shoot, shoot!
Defensively, Stanford needs to Pressure. The. Ball. One thing UCLA did with amazing regularity in their game against USC was to make lazy, off-target and often ill-advised passes which went straight to USC. It seemed like UCLA spent half the game passing the ball to USC. Fortunately for UCLA, USC spent at least that much time giving the ball right back to UCLA. I was amazed watching two elite sides making pass after pass after pass that lacked pace, precision, or both. With good pressure, this is something Stanford can exploit.
Other than horrific defensive mental errors, one other key reason USC lost to UCLA was USC simply took too much time to shoot in and near the box. Taking the extra touch to set up the perfect strike is nice in theory, but good defenders get in front and block it every time, which UCLA did with the exception of the goal they gave up. In womens' soccer there seems to be a general reluctance to one-timing or shooting on the full volley. USC blew several chances by foregoing clear volley opportunites inside the box in favor of taking extra time and teeing it up and shooting. Stanford, if you have a chance at a shot on the full or half volley in the box against UCLA, have a go. Dilly-dally and UCLA will close you down every time.
Stanford will need to be at their best to beat UCLA on the road.
UCLA will likely try to clog the middle with a high-pressure 3-5-2 or maybe even a 3-6-1 formation. The objective will be to force Stanford to bypass their midfield with long balls out of the back. UCLA can defend those long balls all day long and would look for the quick counter, having nullified Stanford's speed and tactical acumen.
Thus, Stanford will need to stay patient, play their game, and use their skill and creativity to unlock the UCLA defense. It may take most of the first hour or more to do it, but do it they can. Simply put, if Stanford gives up and resorts to bootball to overcome UCLA's inevitable midfield pressure they will not win this match.
Stanford will need to use speed and incisive runs on the flanks to stretch the field horizontally. They need their strikers and a-mids to *run at people*. They need to make UCLA foul in their defensive third. Sanford will need to make *judicious* use of long balls and through-balls up the middle from the midfield to stretch the field vertically, serving balls for O'Hara to run onto to terrorize the UCLA backline. The emphasis is of course on the word "judicious", since Stanford's main attack strategy will need to be playing the feet of ther strikers and a-mids and having them run at people, lay off precision passes, and shoot, shoot, shoot!
Defensively, Stanford needs to Pressure. The. Ball. One thing UCLA did with amazing regularity in their game against USC was to make lazy, off-target and often ill-advised passes which went straight to USC. It seemed like UCLA spent half the game passing the ball to USC. Fortunately for UCLA, USC spent at least that much time giving the ball right back to UCLA. I was amazed watching two elite sides making pass after pass after pass that lacked pace, precision, or both. With good pressure, this is something Stanford can exploit.
Other than horrific defensive mental errors, one other key reason USC lost to UCLA was USC simply took too much time to shoot in and near the box. Taking the extra touch to set up the perfect strike is nice in theory, but good defenders get in front and block it every time, which UCLA did with the exception of the goal they gave up. In womens' soccer there seems to be a general reluctance to one-timing or shooting on the full volley. USC blew several chances by foregoing clear volley opportunites inside the box in favor of taking extra time and teeing it up and shooting. Stanford, if you have a chance at a shot on the full or half volley in the box against UCLA, have a go. Dilly-dally and UCLA will close you down every time.
Stanford at Base Camp
My wife and I went to Mount Rainier on an anniversary trip last month. The Paradise area of Mount Rainier is one of the best places to hike on Planet Earth. One of the more aggressive hiking trails there (which I can assure you we did not attempt) is the 9-mile trail up 4600 feet of mountain elevation to Camp Muir. Camp Muir is is the base camp used by elite hiker/climbers who will continue on the dangerous ascent to the summit at 14,410 feet.
With three matches to go in the regular season, the Stanford Womens' Soccer team is almost to base camp. Stanford has won all their games by lopsided scores, save for the tie against theUS National Team UNC Tar Heels. But all that is just trail at their back now. They still have not done anything but have a good regular season.
To get to base camp, the Card needs to beat UCLA in what is effectively the Pac-10 title game this friday. Of course, if the Card does win at UCLA, that does not necessarily mean they'll win the Pac-10. If Stanford were to turn around and lose against USC and then Cal, the Pac-10 would likely go to UCLA. But Stanford needs to look at this next match against UCLA as the match for all the marbles.
To lay claim to having achieved the status of an elite program, and to set the stage for a serious assault on the summit of a national championship instead of flaming out in the early going of the NCAAs, Stanford absolutely, positively must beat UCLA.
The question is, how?
Stay tuned.
With three matches to go in the regular season, the Stanford Womens' Soccer team is almost to base camp. Stanford has won all their games by lopsided scores, save for the tie against the
To get to base camp, the Card needs to beat UCLA in what is effectively the Pac-10 title game this friday. Of course, if the Card does win at UCLA, that does not necessarily mean they'll win the Pac-10. If Stanford were to turn around and lose against USC and then Cal, the Pac-10 would likely go to UCLA. But Stanford needs to look at this next match against UCLA as the match for all the marbles.
To lay claim to having achieved the status of an elite program, and to set the stage for a serious assault on the summit of a national championship instead of flaming out in the early going of the NCAAs, Stanford absolutely, positively must beat UCLA.
The question is, how?
Stay tuned.
DC United Season Wrap-up
This season can be broken up into thirds.
For roughly the first third of the season, nothing went right as DC United tried to integrate a boatload of new players. Complicating matters was our goalkeeper, Zach Wells, who struggled in the early days to acclimate himself to starting in MLS and let in easy goals.
Then, in the middle "third", that is, June and early July, DCU began to click, played some wonderful soccer, and won a lot of games.
Then came the final "third" of the season where we got bit by the injury bug, an overly congested calendar, and some unlucky breaks and simply lost too many games to get into the playoffs.
Here is what needs to happen in the offseason.
1) Get Jaime Moreno healthy and fit for his last year in MLS.
2) Get Gallardo, Peralta, Olsen, Fred, Emilio, and everybody else healthy and fit.
3) Add some defensive depth. Aquiring Janicki was a good first step. But we need a dominating central defender in the mold of Eddie Pope or Ryan Nelsen. Peralta when healthy might be adequate, but if an upgrade at that position is available, I say trade and go for it.
4) Get a better backup 'keeper who is going to push Crayton hard for playing time. Crayon is good, but needs hard competition on the training ground to be his sharpest.
5) Keep Tom Soehn. He wasn't perfect, but he showed he can coach and win games when he has healthy players. Give him another year.
6) Make the defensive midfield play every game like the one they played against Columbus the last game of the season. I haven't seen DC United pressure the ball and close down passing lanes like that since the late 90's.
7) Play the reserves in all nonleague midweek games. These superligas and Open Cups don't mean a hill of beans. Case in point -- this season we actually WON the US Open Cup, but the players, media, and internet fan sites all consider this season a failure. Winning the US Open Cup was not even a consolation prize. So if winning such "Cups" mean nothing, neither do losing them. Send the reserves out for these matches. If THEY win, it'll mean something to them.
With some well-targeted adjustments and some relief from the injury bug, DC United should be in good shape for a serious run at the MLS Cup.
For roughly the first third of the season, nothing went right as DC United tried to integrate a boatload of new players. Complicating matters was our goalkeeper, Zach Wells, who struggled in the early days to acclimate himself to starting in MLS and let in easy goals.
Then, in the middle "third", that is, June and early July, DCU began to click, played some wonderful soccer, and won a lot of games.
Then came the final "third" of the season where we got bit by the injury bug, an overly congested calendar, and some unlucky breaks and simply lost too many games to get into the playoffs.
Here is what needs to happen in the offseason.
1) Get Jaime Moreno healthy and fit for his last year in MLS.
2) Get Gallardo, Peralta, Olsen, Fred, Emilio, and everybody else healthy and fit.
3) Add some defensive depth. Aquiring Janicki was a good first step. But we need a dominating central defender in the mold of Eddie Pope or Ryan Nelsen. Peralta when healthy might be adequate, but if an upgrade at that position is available, I say trade and go for it.
4) Get a better backup 'keeper who is going to push Crayton hard for playing time. Crayon is good, but needs hard competition on the training ground to be his sharpest.
5) Keep Tom Soehn. He wasn't perfect, but he showed he can coach and win games when he has healthy players. Give him another year.
6) Make the defensive midfield play every game like the one they played against Columbus the last game of the season. I haven't seen DC United pressure the ball and close down passing lanes like that since the late 90's.
7) Play the reserves in all nonleague midweek games. These superligas and Open Cups don't mean a hill of beans. Case in point -- this season we actually WON the US Open Cup, but the players, media, and internet fan sites all consider this season a failure. Winning the US Open Cup was not even a consolation prize. So if winning such "Cups" mean nothing, neither do losing them. Send the reserves out for these matches. If THEY win, it'll mean something to them.
With some well-targeted adjustments and some relief from the injury bug, DC United should be in good shape for a serious run at the MLS Cup.
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