Sunday, August 16, 2009

Galaxy React to 2-0 Defeat

Here is what the players had to say following Saturday night's defeat.

LA GALAXY HEAD COACH BRUCE ARENA
On the team’s performance:
“Simply, it is not a good performance for our team tonight. Obviously, the initial red card put us behind the eight ball, and we had to battle for seventy-something minutes with 10, and then eventually nine, and all of that. Disappointing was our start of the second half, and conceding the second goal was highly disappointing; a bunch of guys standing around, watching the Seattle guy making the play. Not a good night tonight, didn’t deserve more than what we got.”

On Landon Donovan’s performance:
“It is certainly wasn’t easy for any attacking player, at that point when you are down with a player, he drew a number of fouls and the second yellow on [Tyrone] Marshall. There were spurts that he played really well, not an easy game for the attacking players with this circumstances that they had to deal with.”

LA GALAXY FORWARD LANDON DONOVAN
On his availability for the game:
“I actually felt really good. In hindsight, I wish I could’ve started the game because I had a lot of energy, but it’s frustrating that I couldn’t play more. He [Bruce Arena] asked me how I was feeling, and I said I thought I could play 45 minutes. Maybe in hindsight, I would’ve tried to start the game and see how I felt at halftime, but in an ideal world, maybe we are winning and I don’t have to come in until even later, but that is how it went tonight.”

On him getting the H1N1 flu:
“Having experience it, it just like any other flu like I ever had, there is obviously a lot of serious cases, but I did a lot of research, and learned a lot about it and the majority of the cases are just like any other flu. The realities and the perceptions are very different, that being said, from what I understand, there is not a lot they know about it. From my experience, it was just a normal flu.”

On David Beckham’s red card:
“In games like that, you rely on the ref to do a good job of keeping things under control, and when the first bad tackle is given a red card then the rest of the game follows. And that is the unfortunate part; it is too bad it has to go that way.”

LA GALAXY MIDFIELDER DAVID BECKHAM
On his red card:
“Pete [Vagenas] is one of my best friends. I think it was a hard tackle but by no means is it a red card. I’ve never gone into a tackle wanting to hurt someone, but the referee saw it different. It was a hard tackle, but not malicious.”

On the game:
“I think the guys battled. It’s always hard when you go down to 10 men and lose a man. It was a tough night for us. We went into the game in such a good position and in such good form, but you can’t win every game.”
LA GALAXY DEFENDER GREGG BERHALTER
On tonight’s game:
“I never want to blame a game on the referee I never want to do that I think that we thought with our attitude and our effort from the beginning and normally we are a team that react conceptive we are disappointed with our effort tonight.”

LA GALAXY MIDFIELDER MIKE MAGEE
On tonight’s game:
“It is pretty disappointing I thought we prepared well. We have gone on a pretty good streak some pretty unfortunate events, some calls didn’t go our way and we didn’t regroup after well enough or as we would like.”

On trying to bounce back into the game:
“We over came a lot of adversity and played without a lot of different guys we are not to worried at this point. Well obviously we would like to get a home win before we go to Chicago and DC but I am sure we will be alright.”

On the two upcoming road games:
“This is a tough stretch of the season. I think we are going to see what we are made of and this will be a good test for us.”

LA GALAXY DEFENDER TODD DUNIVANT:
On playing without Beckham and Lewis in the next game:
“We are going to have to deal with it. It is the reality of the situation we are in, we played early in the year with guys missing and we are going to have to do it again it is always going to happen. Guys are going to have to step up and that is why we have a deep squad it is not easy but we cannot make excuses.”

On the two upcoming road games:
It is going to be a tough week, those are two tough places to play but we have proven that we are really tough on the road. It is time that we grind our teeth again and get out there and hopefully get refocused on this game. We put ourselves in a hole early on and we didn’t respond well and when you do that it makes it real tough to get any points out of the game I think all of us could have done a better job tonight and hopefully we could refocus for next week.

On the how tight the Western Conference is:
“It is tight, it is really one big table at this point if you look at the top nine teams they are all really tight it is going to be a tight run through but we put ourselves in a good position now and we are going to keep playing games and keep getting results. This week will be big we have done well up till now but one game is not going to throw us out of it. We will pick up and be ready for Wednesday.”

7 comments:

charlesj27 said...

Well, I'm glad that Bruce saw the game the way it turned out and is upset/disappointed. Seriously, even now - I'm still shaking my head at the ways the cards so quickly pulled out by the ref, desperado-style. Ridiculous.
Anyways, focusing on the players actually on the field... man-for-man, Seattle fielded a more talented/potent side (and, no, the fact that it was on new sod had nothing to do with either-side players' advantages!). Earlier, a couple of posts back, the Seattle players I had picked that would be the most threat were: Montero, Le Toux, Zakuani, and Jaqua. Well, these guys were definitely in the mix tonight that gave our LA Galaxy team the most problems. Why? Because, these guys know full-well how to make the most use of each of their strengths. Plus, each of them know how to play the ball from central-to-wide-and-back-to-central again. And, they can constantly interchange sides, playing either left or right. Our players have NOT gotten to that point. If good will, understanding, patience, more money, and thorough determination permits... Bruce and Dave and Cobi will still be here with the LA Galaxy for the next two more years, and our squad will be positioned and fashioned that way also.

Anonymous said...

I am second guessing Bruce on his line up for the first time this season.

Starters: Jovan, Alan, Chris, Eddie, David. Average age 52, speed 0.

You take Landon out of the line up and Jovan and Alan are reduced to the zero threat that they are even for the duo of Marshal and Iani with their collective soccer IQ of 23.

Pedestrian team, bad field condition, and the worst performance by the defense all season even w/o the support of guys in front of them. Berhalter was the absolutely rubbish. My fav AJ was totally outclassed by the impressive Zakuani.

Night to forget after such high expectations. Good thing we don't have much time to dwell on this with the Chicago game in just a few days.

charlesj27 said...

Anonymous,
I know the feeling of second-guessing Bruce's picks/starting line-up. Understandable. I've been there many times myself. Allow me to take Bruce's point-of-view for just a few. Bruce is always going to go with consistency in over-all performances over "may be's" or "perhaps" - hence why he consistently leans on and picks the elder guys. You are right, these guys cannot offer us much in terms of speed. No argument. Personally, eventhough Jovan could not score in this game, his body did plenty of tracking back-and-forth on the field yesterday night, trying to cut off their second balls. If he's doing that then who in turn is taking the responsibility of first/second striker? Eddie or Chris ? I hate to say it, but, neither of them have that selfish, powering tenacity that is required as strikers. They're excellent workers and many at times feeders of the ball - but, NOT strikers!!! And, poor Alan for all the posting up, and somewhat holding of the ball he's trying to do; when there's a chance he does get free; he absolutely needs that second or third touch! To me, these factors are our LA Galaxy team's main offensive weakness. Now, on the flip side, put in a healthy Edson, Alecko, Landon, David, and Eddie - then the equation dramatically changes and the output is increased almost five or six fold!
My sincere hope is that Cobi and Dave are constantly pushing, working with, and testing Bryan, Kyle, and Tristan... because, the sooner they get confident and smart; putting up with the demands, the pace, the tenaciousness of MLS - the better off we'll be down the stretch. However, I still think they need to be pushed more and accelerated more aggressively.

Anonymous said...

c27,

my objection was with the starting lineup given the fact that Donovan was out. That reduces the game to long ball by David and who better than Jordan to go and get'em as a second striker and if you know the threat of Zakuani then use Jorden out there to help AJ who was over matched.

Bruce's subs were correct once David went stupid and Kirovsky definitely played hard in the middle when pulled back there.

Bruce has correctly platooned the old guys in the great run that we've had but pairing of Gordon and Kirovsky on top is suspect at best. Even in the game against the Rev he stayed with them way too long and almost gave up the tying goal.

The great mystery to me is Dema. Why isn't he playing? I thought he could play about half game.

With everyone healthy we ARE the best in the league. Let's see what happens in Chicago. Bruce has to go really deep in his roster then.

Max L. in Chicago said...

The MLS referee's are crap!!! I want to know the name of the ref so I can send him the bill of my tickets for the Chicago game next week. It's the only time I could see Becks in the flesh before he leaves MLS and that idiot has to give the marquee player of the league a red!!! Are u kidding me!!!Ref you owe me $400 and Galaxy/Becks fans in Chicago an apology!!! I can't believe I've waited all season long to watch my favorite player next week and now because of a stupid referee who should be fired for his lack of properly calling a game, I can't watch my soccer hero. Well I hope the MLS reviews this guy's contract and send him packing. I wouldn't let this idiot ref my kids AYSO game. Well I hope the Galaxy plays well at Chicago, I'll still be there representing front row!!! Go Galaxy!!! Hey Becks stop bye for a photo op for a loyal fan. I even convinced the Mrs. to name our future first born after you :)

Beckham World said...

Seems like Beckham attracts unwanted attention from ref's as well as disgruntled fans and jealous opposition...
Few decent ref's would have pulled out anything but a yellow for that - it was clumsy, but not malicious - a straight red HAS to have some element of malice, you can see Beckham twisting his foot out of the way so a not to catch the guy's leg.
I'm not saying that the result would have been a lot different, but as we say in the UK: 'You was robbed!'

Anonymous said...

I got to see this game, and I have to say they actually started off pretty good. Once they threw out that ridiculous red card, they fell apart. They missed a lot of give and goes, and I don't know what Landon was doing the whole night, I thought he was going to play much better. No offense to him, I mean he's a great player. All in all it was a good battle, and I appreciate the one player, I think number 15, who came to say hey to the fans. Great game, and although I wish they would have won, they played pretty well.