Freedom Insider

By StarCityFan

Washington Freedom (4-3-5, 17 points, 4nd place) at FC Gold Pride (8-3-1, 25 points, 1st place)
Sunday, July 11, 6 p.m. EDT
Pioneer Stadium, Hayward, Calif.
All-time series: Freedom hold 2-1-1 advantage, last meeting was a 1-1 draw

Cutting-and-pasting the information above from the last meeting between the two teams and then modifying it provides some insight in itself. Going into the last meeting, Washington was in second place and only two points behind FCGP. Since then, the Freedom have gone 0-1-4 to drop from second to fourth and fall eight points behind the pace, as Gold Pride went 3-1-1. It would be a nice time to turn that around, but I’m not hopeful.

The spanner in the works is that the US National Teamers have been called into camp. The Freedom will be without Sarah Huffman, Allie Long, and Abby Wambach for this game (and probably the next), while Gold Pride will be missing Nicole Barnhart, Shannon Boxx, Rachel Buehler and Kelley O’Hara. It’s a blow to both teams, but I think more to Washington. We will be without our marquee player and our pesky defensive midfielders while Gold Pride still has Christine Sinclair and Marta. If nothing else, we may find out just how much credit Allie and Huffy deserve for the Freedom’s improved defensive play this year.

To look on the optimistic side, Gold Pride is missing some key players as well. Boxx is simply one of the best midfielders in the world, and it’s a big step down from Barnhart to whomever will be starting in goal instead: Erin Guthrie was selected in the fourth round of the college draft this year, and Brittany Cameron was picked up as a free agent, so unless one of them turns out to be a sleeper like Karen Bardsley, they won’t be nearly as formidable.

For the Freedom lineup, I see Christie Welsh starting in Abby’s position, and perhaps she and Lene Mykjåland can get the ball past an inexperienced goalkeeper – or maybe Nikki Marshall will move up front again and show how she became Colorado’s all-time leading scorer even before her senior year (I was pretty excited by that little experiment – were you?).

In the midfield, I would expect to see Beverly Goebel and Brittany Klein. This might be promising. Goebel’s done well so far, and Klein earned her WPS All-Star position last year through determination and hard work. So perhaps we won’t be in as much trouble as I’m afraid of.

Anyhow, it should be an exciting match, and only the second Freedom road match to be on the Fox Soccer Channel. If any of you want to watch the game with some like-minded souls, feel free to join the Freedom Fighters viewing party at the Murphy’s Law Irish Restaurant, on the west side of Wisconsin Avenue just a few blocks north of the Tenleytown Metro station. See you there!

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By StarCityFan

By the numbers:
Position in standings: 4th (final playoff position)
Standings points: 17
Record: 4-3-5
Goals scored: 17 (3rd in league)
Goals allowed: 14 (5th in league)
Home record: 3-1-3 (2nd in league)
Away record: 1-2-2 (6th in league)

We’re halfway through the season, and the Freedom are in playoff position, though just barely and only after a fairly favorable schedule, with seven home games out of 12. And the Freedom are the most home-biased team in the league, with one of the best records at home but one of the worst on the road (The only worse road team is the expansion Atlanta Beat, who have had a hard time winning anywhere).

In fact, I think the Freedom should be in a better position than they are. If you look at the schedule and assume they should generally beat the teams below them and lose to the teams ahead of them, they’ve been upset more often than they’ve upset the opposition. They’ve faced the fifth place Chicago Red Stars twice and the sixth place Boston Breakers twice each, all at the SoccerPlex, but only have three points to show for it out of a possible 12 (one loss and three draws). On the other side, they beat Philadelphia at home and tied FC Gold Pride and Sky Blue FC on the road, and of those the only one that feels like a genuine upset is the Gold Pride match. But let’s be generous and say the Freedom picked up five upset points but while letting 12 upset points go for a net of minus-7.

Basically, that means that if Washington had kept to form they’d be in second place, one point behind the league leaders, instead of fourth and eight points behind.

But that’s all water under the bridge. Instead, let’s look ahead. As I’ve noted before, the Freedom start out the second half of the season with six out of eight games on the road, and the only two home games are against the top two teams in the league. But there are some glimmers of hope. Two of the road matches are against the Boston Breakers in Boston, where the Breakers have yet to win this year – heck, they’re worse at home than any other team is on the road. On the other hand, the Washington Freedom have never, ever beaten a Boston team in Boston, going back to the WUSA days (You can even extend this to the W-League days on a technicality, because the W-League Boston Renegades played in Framingham). Perhaps it’s high time.

With regard to play on the field, the Freedom have combined old problems with new ones. Washington has always had an issue of consistency throughout the WPS era: if the offense is successful, the defense is inept. If the defense holds on for a shutout, the offense doesn’t score. Freedom matches seem to be either 0-0 or 4-3, without a whole lot in between. The new issue is holding onto a lead, something I’ve discussed before and so won’t go into again.

I think we have the talent to compete at the highest levels in this league. Gold Pride may have Marta, but we have Abby Wambach. Philadelphia has Karina LeBlanc and Allison Falk, but we have Erin McLeod and Cat Whitehill. Sky Blue has Heather O’Reilly and Rosana, but we have Sonia Bompastor and Homare Sawa. I think it comes down to desire, teamwork and focus. We’ll find out in the remaining 12 matches if the Freedom have enough of all of those to remain in contention.

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By StarCityFan

If you wanted to see fireworks on Sunday night at the SoccerPlex, you had to stick around for the pyrotechnic kind because there weren’t any during the game, as neither the Washington Freedom nor the Chicago Red Stars could put the ball in the net.

The Freedom’s problem was that they seldom seemed to be able to get their attack organized enough to make a serious threat. I can only remember a handful of exciting moments that weren’t from set pieces. In the seventh minute, Lene Mykjåland got the ball and headed for the back line. She passed the ball over to Abby Wambach then got it back right as she passed through the line, but she wasn’t able to get a shot off before Chicago goalkeeper Jillian Loyden nabbed it. As the first half was winding down, Wambach got behind the defense but from a challenging angle on the left side, and her shot went just barely wide of the right post. In the 60th minute, Lene did a beautiful job of weaving through the defense in order to get off a centering pass, but Abby didn’t run onto it in time. Two minutes later, Abby and Sarah Huffman came charging downfield against a retreating defense. Abby’s centering pass was right to Sarah’s feet in front of goal, but Huffy was called offsides on the play. In the 77th minute, Nikki Marshall, now playing forward, had a two-on-one break with Abby, but Nikki’s cross from the left flank was off-target and cleared for a corner kick.

Chicago had far more chances, but either the Freedom back line or Erin McLeod came up with a big play, the shot was from such a distance that McLeod just gobbled it up, or the shot was taken by Ella Masar, who despite her two-goal game last week seemed unable to hit the broad side of a barn from three yards away.

In the very early going, a Red Stars player whose identity I didn’t catch made an acrobatic over-the-back kick off a throw-in that sprung Masar into the box just outside the left post, but her shot went wide left. Ella had the ball in front of goal in the 14th minute but was stripped from behind. Cristiane wasted an extended Chicago possession two minutes later by taking a shot from 25 yards out that went high. Two minutes after that, Chicago had a two-on-one break, but Masar’s shot went over the goal from about 10 yards out. In the 35th minute, Chicago took a free kick from 35 yards out that Erin tipped over the bar. The resulting corner kick provided a nice heading opportunity, but the ball went straight to Erin. Cristiane sprung Masar in the 37th minute, but Erin managed to save the shot. Four minutes later, Cristiane got through with only Marshall to beat, but Nikki managed to knock the ball out for a corner kick. The corner kick resulted in one of those heart-in-mouth sequences when the ball is being knocked around among a scrum of players right in front of goal. A Chicago player who couldn’t have been much more than a yard out knocked the ball toward goal, but somehow Sonia Bompastor managed to get in the way of it and clear it out of danger.

Three minutes into the second half, Cat Whitehill made a bad clearance to Cristiane, who took a quick shot trying to catch McLeod off her guard, but Erin was ready and managed to grab it. Megan Rapinoe wasted another Red Stars possession in the 54th minute by taking a low shot from about 20 yards out that went wide left. A free kick from 30 yards in the next minute went right to Erin, as did a long shot that concluded another passing sequence a minute later. I was beginning to wonder if Chicago had any other strategies in mind.

Shortly thereafter, Masar got in a footrace with Whitehill, but despite the speed differential, Ella was prevented from getting a shot off. In the 65th minute, Rapinoe sprung Cristiane behind the defense, but Marshall’s catch-up speed was just enough for her to slide-tackle the ball out-of-bounds cleanly before Cristiane could get a shot off. That corner kick resulted in an off-target header, as did another one a minute later, with Masar managing to head the ball wide from three yards out. She was almost immediately replaced by Casey Nogueira, a development I found worrying as Nogueira is a deadly finisher.

In the 73rd minute, Cristiane and Kosovare Asllani tried to do some clever passing in the box to get McLeod out-of-position, but they tried one pass too many, and Erin was able to get to the ball. Chicago took another long shot that went wide shortly thereafter. There was a scary moment for the Freedom in the 81st minute as Whitehill fell when trying to clear the ball, instead sending it rolling slowly towards Nogueira. But the Freedom defenders in the area quickly converged, and forced Nogueira to give up the ball to Karen Carney, who got off a good shot but one that McLeod managed to grab. In the 84th minute, Nogueira got her own breakaway. Erin came out to challenge her near the perimeter of the box, but missed. Fortunately for the Freedom, Casey’s shot trickled just wide of the right post. Chicago had one last chance on a good-looking cross in stoppage time, but the player in front of the goal couldn’t get her head to it before it went by.

All in all, the Freedom were fortunate to keep a clean sheet. Some of it was luck, some of it was poor finishing by Chicago, and a lot of it was hard work by the back line and McLeod. At the other end, it’s a bit of a mystery as to why the Freedom attack was so anemic. I wonder a bit if our young Norwegian is having problems adjusting to the scorching weather, as she seemed to disappear for long periods of time during the game.

Interesting developments include Marshall’s first minutes at forward and Brittany Klein’s first few minutes (starting at 87) for the Freedom, period. It will be interesting to see if there’s much more of either.

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I would imagine by now you have at least seen the results from the USWNT vs. International Abby XI vs. Marta XI WPS All-Star game. Apparently over 4,600 were on hand to see Marta score two goals in leading her team to a 5-2 victory. Not bad for a league that has been criticized for its lack of goal scoring.

It was also fun to see the league try something new to engage fans other than just letting them vote for the players that should be in the game. The “playground” style picking process the league touted was a fun wrinkle for a game that should be about the fans.

Of course the biggest negative to come out of the game has to be the injury Sky Blue FC GK Karen Bardsley suffered in training. SBFC is now without its No. 1 GK for 6-8 weeks, and it happened training for a game that meant nothing to SBFC’s position in the standings. This always seems to be the biggest argument against in-season All-Star games and this incident will probably get the league rethinking the move from postseason to midseason.

It will also be interesting to see how the players rebound this weekend’s matches. Hopefully for us Freedom fans Abby Wambach, Cat Whitehill, Erin McLeod, Sonia Bompastor and Becky Sauerbrunn will be ready for Chicago on Sunday.

LINKS

Here are a couple of articles I found over the last two days that are worth checking out if you are looking for something to read.

• An Interview With Becky Sauerbrunn (All White Kit) – The interview took place before the All-Star game but most of the questions weren’t All-Star related and is worth a read.
• After bad break, Wambach returns to form in WPS (USA Today) – It’s good to get more pub in one of the biggest papers in the nation but is it really necessary to center this article around Abby’s leg injury that occurred two years ago?
• Wambach a leader in more ways than one (The Gazette) – Apparently it was Abby Wambach day in the media yesterday, both locally and nationally. This article has some mentions of the leg break but it also recaps the season so far for the Freedom.

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Enough has been said since Abby Wambach and Marta selected their starting XI’s for the All-Star Game tomorrow night. Rather than rehash the main comment (it looks like the USWNT vs. the International All-Star format) I will say that at least the build-up to the event had the illusion of suspense.

One area I think most All-Star games miss is that there is not enough excitement built in to the event. The NFL game, while in Hawaii, is a dud. MLB ties home-field advantage for the World Series to the outcome and I think it has gotten to the point that few people care. The NBA does a lot of fun and flashy things, including the skills challenge the night before, and because the players want to be involved, it works. I think WPS is trying to do something more fan-friendly with this format and depending on how the game ends, it could work well.

And just in case you haven’t seen them yet, here are the rosters:

Abby XI (green/home; Abby Wambach – Captain, Paul Riley – Head Coach)
Starters
#1 – Hope Solo, GK, Atlanta Beat
#3 – Amy LePeilbet, D, Boston Breakers
#6 – Lori Lindsey, M, Philadelphia Independence
#7 – Shannon Boxx, M, FC Gold Pride
#8 – Tina Ellertson, D, Atlanta Beat
#9 – Eniola Aluko, F, Atlanta Beat
#10 – Heather O’Reilly, M, Sky Blue FC
#11 – Lauren Cheney, F, Boston Breakers
#17 – Lori Chalupny, M, Atlanta Beat
#20 – Abby Wambach, F, Washington Freedom
#84 – Cat Whitehill, D, Washington Freedom

Reserves
#4 – Angie Kerr, M, Atlanta Beat
#14 – Karen Carney, M, Chicago Red Stars
#19 – Kelley O’Hara, F, FC Gold Pride
#21 – Laura Kalmari, M, Sky Blue FC
#66 – Tasha Kai, F, Sky Blue FC
#85 – Jillian Loyden, GK, Chicago Red Stars
Kate Markgraf, D, Chicago Red Stars (injured/not rostered)

Marta XI (white/away; Marta – Captain, Albertin Montoya – Head Coach)
Starters
#1 – Karen Bardsley, GK, Sky Blue FC
#3 – Allison Falk, D, Philadelphia Independence
#4 – Rachel Buehler, D, FC Gold Pride
#7 – Kelly Smith, M, Boston Breakers
#8 – Sonia Bompastor, M, Washington Freedom
#9 – Ramona Bachmann, F, Atlanta Beat
#10 – Marta, F, FC Gold Pride
#12 – Christine Sinclair, F, FC Gold Pride
#13 – Kristine Lilly, M, Boston Breakers
#14 – Brittany Taylor, D, Sky Blue FC
#24 – Aya Miyama, M, Atlanta Beat

Reserves
#5 – Christie Rampone, D, Sky Blue FC
#11 – Becky Sauerbrunn, D, Washington Freedom
#17 – Amy Rodriguez, F, Philadelphia Independence
#18 – Erin McLeod, GK, Washington Freedom
#22 – Alex Scott, D, Boston Breakers
#78 – Cristiane, F, Chicago Red Stars
Caroline Seger, M, Philadelphia Independence (injured/not rostered)

USWNT Call-ups

Congratulations are in order for Sarah Huffman and Allie Long, both of whom earned call-ups to the USWNT for the two friendlies against Sweden in July. It is nice to see some new faces getting an opportunity to prove themselves and hopefully things will go well for Huffman and Long. The only question I have is where is Becky Sauerbrunn? The WPS Ironwoman gets snubbed again. Maybe its time for an online campaign or something…

Klein’s blog

New Freedom player Brittany Klein is actually pretty internet savvy and has her own website, that includes a blog. Her latest post is about joining the Freedom and is worth a read. She also has a live chat feature on her blog so if you feel like chatting with her, head on over and say hi.

More Harris features

Apparently people still can’t get over Saint Louis Athletica folding midseason and talking with former players of the franchise makes for interesting feature stories local networks are using to promote the league. I guess that’s both good and bad. Anyway, in DC we only have Ashlyn Harris to chat with so here is another story on her journey of late.

Whitehill on the World Cup

Cat continues her blog on Soccer365.com and her latest post is on how watching the World Cup is helping her improve her game. Got to love the dedication and hopefully this new knowledge will translate into on-the-field results soon.

Remembering Vanole

For fans of the WUSA Freedom, this article that appeared last week on former Freedom assistant David Vanole is a must-read. Tom Friend does a great job of painting Vanole’s life and showing his role in helping soccer gain more recognition in the U.S.

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