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Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at Shopify.com/Westwood1. All lowercase. Go to Shopify.com/Westwood1 now to grow your business. No matter what stage you're in, Shopify.com/Westwood1. Welcome everyone to a very special flyover fallout, and I say special in a way that is, gosh, I hope you like it because it's going to be different than usual. It is me, Phil Grooms here, filling in for Santiago and Matt Baker, of course, and Justin Horock is here to join me. Thank goodness. Hello. Happy to be back again. Not just Justin, but Lily is here to join us. We've been trying to wait for her nap, and she's not having it today, is she just? Yeah, I'm a daughter of my feet. So hopefully, hopefully she falls asleep during the podcast, but yeah, she's a suburb napper. It's not our first, you know, not our first time. It can be so frustrating. I was commenting on how calm you've been about the whole thing, so wonderful. Thank you again for pushing through, and I hope Lily takes it easy on you here. Oh, I see I can talk or two. Yeah, yeah, homes are down, I think. I like that. Well, yeah, once again, you are listening to flyover fallout, we're presented by noble ice vineyards. Can't forget that. This is winery season. I hope you guys go check out their wines and get out to their beautiful vineyard. Enjoy yourselves, but Justin, let's jump into this game. Obviously, if you're watching this, you know that it was a 2-2 draw against New England Revolution, and it wasn't without drama, for sure. You know, I think we're going to go over everything that happened, but, you know, we'll start with the lineup, and then we'll kind of talk for a second before we jump into some of the big plays of the game. The lineup started for St. Louis. It was Berkey. Norwinsky came in again, rewarded on at right back for doing such a good job last game. Kessler and Hebert at center back, Horn playing left back, even after putting in what was considered to be more minutes than hopeful. Pushed him on minutes. They said last time Horn did get the start. Durk and Louvin at D-mid. Vasilev got the start at right wing. That was another one we were wondering would, would Thor start? Toilet in the middle, hard on the left, bet your up top, no start for Klaus as of yet. But all of that did change quite a bit, and I'm excited to start talking about that, but just any thoughts on the lineup itself? No, yeah, I think it was pretty much what we expected last week. Maybe a little bit surprised to see Norwinsky starting again. I thought maybe, but I think he got a reward on for that performance last weekend. So, you know, nothing to mind blowing, I think. Completely agree. Let's talk about the revs real quick. Vrioni starting up top, Barrero on the left, Carlos Hill on the central, of course, at the 10, Lengoni on the right. Matt Holster is the former, as Stuart said, the former SIUE player, playing along Harks, Ian Harks at center mid. Will Sands on the left recently traded to the revs. Tim Parker also, obviously, recently traded to the revs. Romney, his centerback partner, and Peyton Miller, 16-year-old, right back, playing a little bit out of position I found out. And then when I considered the star of the game, Eva Chitch in goal is relatively new, I think, to the revs. But I don't know the history there. Justin, do you have any info for us? Because I'm not terribly familiar with them. Yeah, I think he had a not a run-in, but he had a disagreement with Portland last season, and they signed up in April as kind of an option, and then he's kind of come through in key moments for him. And obviously this weekend, he was their biggest asset in the way. Absolutely. I think so too. All right, well, let's jump into some of the things that happened. I think St. Louis got off to a very hot start. I think St. Louis looked like the better team for a good stretch in the very beginning, starting even before the first minute happened. Leuven had one of my favorite plays of the game, and it happened so early. Leuven had an insular pass to Hartle. And Hartle, you know, how many times we saw in this game, St. Louis kind of circling the box, the goalkeeper box, passing it around, passing it around, and how many times have we seen that a team bonkered, and St. Louis just can't do anything about it. And in the 55th second of the game, Hartle makes an insular run, a diagonal run, and not only was that a smart move, but Leuven is good enough to hit him, making that run inside. And he had a cutback pass to Indy on the far side, not quite the top of the box. And he shot it wide. Everything I just said about that, this is stuff that St. Louis was not able to solve this problem, you know, six months ago, were they? Yeah, and I think we talked about last week about how, you know, the way to beat this team, like six months ago, was to give them session, and they would just not know what to do with any seed in this game, especially what Hartle can do with his runs and with the ball and just with his playmaking, how he links up with Leuven, like already you see progress being made in like the first foray forward, they get into the box and create something. Yeah, and if I'm a bit of a jerk, I will say that, you know, Indy being part of the original crew, not able to finish that one off, but that is something that has been improving as well, that, you know, the finishing has been a lot better with with the lineup that we've gotten. So just something to notice there, it's not the last time we'll kind of mention something like that. In the third minute, Derken got a long distance ball that wasn't terribly hard to handle in the fourth minute. This is one of the worst giveaways of the game, Heber gives it away kind of in the middle backfield, and it was like pressure from New England Revolution, but they were well positioned. It's kind of like it felt like what I consider Minnesota's best qualities are on defense is they were just kind of in position, and it was hard for Heber to find a pass and he did very badly there. Yeah, I think they still had to figure out how to connect the centerbacks to the midfield centrally, especially that's kind of an issue that we see prop up, especially kind of as this half goes on. Yeah, that's a good thing to notice. That's not something I notice a lot of. What do you do you think just like bringing another guy in and getting a better position to collect the ball and typically it's kind of been Derken? Yeah, and I think Derken just like has a habit of advancing forward a little bit more than you would maybe want like your dedicated six to be. So I think it's just like they maybe need someone to be that guy that stays home a little bit more. Yeah, fair enough. In the seventh minute, just something to note, we mentioned probably not enough that the big thing about this game was that Tim Parker and Kessler were playing against the former teams in this one, just like a really crazy situation that happened to work itself into this season. And this was like the first time I kind of took note in the seventh minute. It was a bit of a long ball to betcher and Parker cleared it out for a corner. So a little bit of good for both sides there. It was nice that St. Louis got the corner and they did well with it. Battling, Tim Parker was battling all game. In fact, Justin, didn't we talk about aerial battles and like who, you know, ours, both teams had pretty good aerial dual stats and how much of that was Parker. Here's a good example of that working out for them. Hardle to horn. It was, oh, yeah, this was a good corner. Hardle found himself in space, almost at like the penalty spot it felt like. Unbelievably, he got just a total clear header on that one and went straight to the keeper unfortunately. But good work getting someone open on a corner. That's we're going to see a little bit more of that soon. Yeah, a harbinger of things to come on that corner. Yeah, but like both both these first like three corner pieces they had were all very dangerous. And I think like outside pieces all night there, they're very dangerous. I completely agree. The 11th minute, Louven turns it over. It's a risky touch from, we get the ball and this is a good turnover for Louven. A risky touch from Peyton Miller, that 16 year old right back, who I thought did really well in this game. And the risky thing, like I think they ripped him a little bit on the broadcast, but you know Miller was just trying to make a play. And unfortunately, one miss can be so dangerous. And so Louven was able to find Horn running on. It was defended out for a corner. And I think Peyton actually caught back up to him and got that to find it out. So, you know, good on him even though he made the mistake. And I think they were, you know, they're trying to target him a little bit, especially early, like a 16 year old full back to, you know, be able to stand there. And even though there were some mistakes to still play strongly for most of this match, like that's, that's pretty strong, I think. Very strong, completely great. 12 minute Parker handball. What do you think? Yes or no? I mean, I mean, I don't even, I don't even know anymore. I thought that this one, I think just because like he doesn't really move his hand in a way or like move his body in a way where like it's unnatural, I think like just kind of standing there in his normal kind of stride and hits on like, I'm cool with this no-call. If I'm a New England fan, I may be a little bit angrier at the end of this game. I think we'll get to it at some point. But yeah, I think this one was right. Yeah. You know, I mean, it's a spectrum, right? And so I tend to appreciate a no-call. You know, I'd, even this one went against us and I still appreciate there was no call because I just, you know, no one's going out there trying to get a handball to win a game. So just like, no-call is the best way to go. Yeah, that's how I feel too. Like I think, and the rules not this way. So I'm not saying this in like the interpretation of the rule, but like in my head, like handball should be like a deliberate attempt to just stop progress in the box, but that's not right. Right. And that's not how it's written. And we'll get to the other side of that when it's appropriate, of course. 20th minute, Horn gets a yellow. Man, I didn't look how many yellows were in this game. It was at least four for St. Louis. And every one of them was like a tactical foul, actually. Yeah. And I think like, I think that's part of the criticism with the refereeing that I have from this game too, from like both perspectives. I feel like I don't know what the threshold was between like a solid yellow, and I think it changed throughout the game. If I was a player, I would probably be a little bit frustrated on like what was a yellow, but anyway, yeah, I think this one was deserved. Yeah, I actually think all the St. Louis ones were pretty well deserved, but I don't, I can't, I don't have a good memory of the New England ones. And I think a couple come up here, so maybe you can comment on that as we get to it. Or do you have something now? No, I did okay on the yellows, but I don't. Yeah, I think it was just like in my head, like some, I think the threshold of like fallacy yellows were not consistent. Got it. Yeah. Okay, duly noted. 21st minute, Indy gets a shot out for the corner. It was blocked. Again, more possession around the box. We're seeing a lot of that. And here is St. Louis getting something from it, a corner, and not just a corner, but this is the corner where Kessler was able to score a goal. Again, good design, Justin. What did you see here? Yeah, good design play and like the body control from Kessler because he's kind of like fading away as he jumps up to like get his head on the ball and then the arc over the goalkeeper. It was a very visually pleasing aesthetically pleasing. Very much so. Yeah, Matt Baker leaned into the basketball fadeaway reference and I thought it was well said. Perfect. Yeah, very pleasing aesthetically. Well said. And like we talked about aerial goals and here is, you know, Henry Kessler, who comes from New England and they didn't have, haven't had success scoring offset pieces. And then I got to say, yeah, that's an Alex Langer special. I think it's our St. Louis super power for sure. Absolutely. And you know, kind of going against what I was saying that maybe Parker was all of our stats. Here is Kessler doing a really good job with that. So awesome. In the 24th minute Miller cuts inside and gets an easy shot off. This is that right back playing out of position. I assume he's an attacker based on what people have been saying normally. The 16 year old and the only thing of note here is that he went way too far, I think. And Berkey got pretty angry about it and started yelling at people. This is, you know, felt like we scored and started taking it a little too easy maybe. Yeah. Yeah, and I think just like the organization, Hackworth, I kind of talked about a little bit after the match and just like his frustration, especially in the first half was just kind of the intensity of which, you know, after they scored that goal, they do kind of drop off and just, I don't know if it's letting the foot off the gas necessarily, but there's something missing and very execution that was fixed in the second half. Yeah, we're going to dig into that shortly, actually really strongly. In the 27th minute Kessler slips defending one V one against Langone, yeah, Langone, it felt under control in this defense. Everyone was in their place and it just felt like Kessler slipped and that was it. It was a goal just from him slipping. I don't know if he felt otherwise though. Yeah, it's a bit unlucky, a bit unforgiving, but yeah, like it seems like he hasn't managed, but he just loses an edge on that turf. It was a little bit slick, I think, but what are you going to do? Yeah, this happens, unfortunately. Yeah, and I think there's critique to be had from City in this game. I just don't want that one to be one of them. Yeah, and I think he does get the corner on Kessler and I think part of the reason he slips is because he's, you know, digging into ketchup, right? Absolutely fair. 20th minute shot from Hardell, easy save, 29th minute, great turnover. This is, you know, a lot of people are like angry at St. Louis for sitting back too much and we will touch on that, but here's like good pressing, St. Louis kind of pressing and tightening the news slowly, a little bit closer on each pass. Torquette got a shot off, but it was extremely easy to save. So yet another, you know, this is an Eva Chitch having a great save. It was just like another easy one, but at this point it was in the broadcast, they said that Eva Chitch has second most saves in the league and we talked about how New England gives up a lot of shots. And so, you know, I don't know how much of that is okay or to plan because clearly they're giving up bad shots in a lot of these cases, but it is what it is. What do you think? Yeah, and I think like something just with their structure has been off at times this year. And as you see, as we've seen with St. Louis, like when the formation and like the spacing is off, it just allows for these shots to come in the box when they can exploit those spaces opening up. Yep, I agree. The 31st minute we have a few stats coming in. I just want to take note that it was 0.29 XG for New England to 0.52 XG for St. Louis. Two to seven on shots, two to five shots on goal. So St. Louis is dominating the game up to this point. And it's kind of funny that they put those stats in right there in the game because it was a bit of a turning point, wasn't it? Yeah, yeah. And like, I think this is like it's a turning point of like going into half it felt like they're maybe a little bit lucky to be up to one just because they had to like really just sustain this period of possession from New England. Yes, they're a little bit on it felt like a little bit. The 33rd minute, there's a couple of counters St. Louis gets to where he gets the ball at the end line in one of them. And he gets a cut back pass. This is one where toilet chased, Toyker chased it down and did a great job getting to the ball cuts it back to a good spot. Louven first time shot. This was a great save blocked by Eva, Eva Chitch. That passed past a couple players on the way to get to the Louven. So just really well done here keeping it alive, getting a shot on goal. Pretty good XG on that one, I imagine. What do you think Justin? Because it's about to kind of change. Yeah, I feel like this was something that, you know, when they get to half time, they kind of hold it up as you know, this is how we can attack us, how we can be successful. And like, yeah, as you say, you know, the 10 minutes leading into the end of the half, it definitely felt like they needed to change something. Yeah, 36 minute city starts sitting back. Pressure is absorbed after a scary moment with Norwinski. And this 36th minute is like a carbon copy of how New England gets the goal. And it just felt like, I think, I think on first watch, I was like, Jake's too high here. Why didn't he track back? But there was some confusion between, was Indy supposed to take the guy with the ball and let Jake, you know, retreat and cover. Or also, it felt like city was like half pressing up to make sure they, you know, double triple teams that that guy with the ball and get a turnover. And they were able to break the press. And it was like this feeling like, you know, the D meds were pushed up, they do a better job of calling this out when the goal happens. But we might as well kind of put this together that in the 37th minute, it's like the same situation. Barrera gets in, he gets it crossed in. Oh, Willie. She gets a lot more. Maybe they want to choose tires. Yup. Okay, well, okay, sorry for the crime baby again. Not at all. She's doing really well. If I was just talking, we have like a two-year-old in our friend group. And yeah, it's like, they didn't let her, we were like, no, let her run around in the house. And they're like, no, we'll just be waiting for like that box sound and a massive cry like it's inevitable. Yeah. This goes like, um, yeah, they get tired and they like, you know, they're just trying to hold on to things and then fall on the head. Well, we'll start right there too. We might as well go into the goal itself. Well, first, really quickly, in the 37th minute, Barrera gets it in, it gets the ball and it's crossed in. Sands is able to cross it to the top of the box to Barrera again, and he hits the post. So the 37th minute, this isn't the carbon copy chance, but it is a really good chance. It's out for a corner and it's able to be taken care of. But here is the goal, right? The 39th minute, again, he'll gets past Norwinski. And we're talking about the DMs have had pressed forward, but they weren't like shutting everything down. They weren't close enough to get that turnover quite yet. Should India track back? Should Jake have retreated? And, you know, in city's identity, they want to press that ball, get a turnover and push forward on the counter. And it didn't happen. So I don't know what you think, Justin, because I'm of so many different minds. And maybe this is what we're getting to is, are they supposed to be compact, sitting back, waiting for the pressure to come and turn it over? Or should we have seen Carnel? Carnel would have been like, why weren't there four people on this ball for a turnover? Are they caught in two minds here? Are they still figuring out what to do? Yeah, I think you kind of nail it. Like they're copped into your minds of like what they want this back line to do, because if you like look at just the spacing in between, you know, where Betra was and where the back, like the center pack pairing was, like there's a lot of, a lot of open space. It's not very compact. So, like I think Hackworth wants them to be more compact. And that's where you see like the spacing open up, and like Carlos, he was on the ball. He's not necessarily closed down. I think like Hebert does a pretty good job, eventually closing him down. But he'll just like, he's so good. You can't give this guy any bit of space. And he hits that shot like through Hebert's legs into the far corner. So, like it's also a great effort from Heel on top of just the spacing breakdown. Yeah, Berkie kind of watched it go in. I think he just kind of knew either he thought it was going wide or he just knew he couldn't get to it based on his stance there. And Twelman did a great job breaking that down, because, you know, the point was, you know, should Durk and Louven have pushed up and gotten that turnover or sat back, because if they weren't up, then one of them would have been there to kind of give a double team on Heel as he tried to shoot that ball. I think they're trying to be aggressive. And I think, you know, one of Durk and Louven has to decide like one of them has to sit back more. And I think, especially Durk and, you know, his mentality is to get forward even when he is playing at that six. So he's not necessarily like a true six in what you maybe need from that obsession. But yeah, I think that's that's where you see him play out. Yep. You know, a lot of guys came in in this transfer window on top of that Hackworth has changed the system. So you could see this is like early season kind of mistakes. Maybe maybe not something to watch though, as watch how, you know, are we going to be pressing harder? Are we going to sit back? Or is it just like some kind of a mid block positioning problem, something to watch? Yeah, I really, I, we kind of asked Hackworth about it afterwards, because it felt like to me when they went to the three in the back, that things like change spacing wise, but he said it was more of a mentality thing and just like getting the players onto the pitch for the formation change. So like I think in his mind, it's just like getting the players to commit you know, what they're asking them to do defensively. And as a fan, that's my favorite answer, because I do want to see more intensity, you know, that whole spam you just mentioned, everyone looked a little bit laid back, you know, with even after the they tied it up, it felt a little bit too calm and collected. So that's the answer I want. I like it. Thanks, Hack. Appreciate it. Maybe that change will happen and it'll fix everything. A couple turnovers, quick transitions. Torquette had a shot blocked for a couple of corners in a row that happened. Dangerous corners, nothing came of them for interest of time. We'll skip forward. Some weird injuries too. He ever got a bloody nose. I didn't see when this happened. At some point, Andy started limping and went off for a little while. The heaver thing. Yeah, I didn't even see it on the replay. Like he kind of gets into it with on the New England players on the corner, but like, I don't know where he got hit in the nose at all. And then like all of a sudden, he's just bleeding, but then just has a nose wave. Yeah. And it's not dry air. It was about to pour down, right? Yeah. You know what I mean? So I'm sure you got hit. It just like I couldn't even see it on the broadcast. So it was just one of his eyes were very, you know, glossy as if you got hit in the nose, you know, that kind of thing. So I imagine you're right. We just didn't see what it was. Yeah. But Andy came back in in a couple of weeks after the game too. And they said like, Andy is just like a weird thing with, I guess like in that tackle, he kind of gets tied up a little bit and then just kind of put pressure like he couldn't flex his foot during that moment. So yeah, like they said, it's not a big deal or they're hoping it's not a big deal. So absolutely. Right for the half, the only thing of note that really bothered me was Hardell was kind of in and he was 1v1 versus someone and it was like almost a foul. Maybe it was a foul, but he kind of went down easy instead of charging ahead. That's I would have liked for him to charge ahead, but you know, it is what it is. For the rescue tape. Yeah. It's one of those high end Ferrari type players to be fair. Yeah. So you know, I understand the mentality there to some extent, and he makes up for it, of course. That's the half. Any thoughts on the first half, Justin? No, yeah, I think like it's obvious. I think they're maybe a little bit lucky to be in at 2-1, but also like you could see the progress and like going into the half. Like my thought was that they were going to have to bring on different personnel. Like I thought Nerwinski did fine, but I thought maybe if he brought talent and on that right side, someone to push it up and someone to kind of be more mobile, it would be better. But like I think Nerwinski did fine on that right side. And then as you see the changes that will come were a little more impactful. I'll top and just getting more attacking players on the field too. Yep. And we'll get to it. Thorson comes on at the half. This isn't the adjustment we're talking about quite yet though. He played as part of course, and the rain. It just went for it. I wonder how much of that like indie injury kind of changes. And then like the plan also. Yeah. And I mean, I made the argument that I thought Thor would be more useful in this game. Yeah. That wasn't well-founded necessarily in the first half because there were several transition moments indeed being in the right place the right time. So I'm not saying I was right, but Thorson shows some of his qualities being helpful in different ways as we go through here. Just you know, keep note that I was right everybody to some degree is what I'm saying here. Those actions were correct everyone. Yeah. And I'm here to tell you that that is true. 47th minute quick passing gets a ball to horn a good cross from him for a blocked shot. Oh and see I'm already defending myself here. Thor had a key pass here to Luvin for a blocked shot I think after the cross or something by the corner. But you know Thor kind of looped a ball forward for Luvin and the shot was blocked. That was just a nice move for Thor. I'm just defending him because everyone was really mad at him rightfully so. But he did some good things here. He gets any good spaces and yeah I think everyone you know the the disappointment they may have is I don't know if we get to the notes but you know he gets to a point where he has kind of a shot on goal in a very close quarters and kind of lays it off and I think that's the lassie and fresh you know Thor from this game unfortunately. Yes yes and we'll hit it a couple times 50th minute. Rioni draws a foul there's striker number nine and it's yellow for Kessler. It was a long ball and so I guess Kessler kind of went in a little hard. Rioni did a good job of making a meal of it for sure. Yeah and he kind of holds on to his arm as he's falling. I think that's what I saw to call yellow. Yeah it's like a striker's mouth for sure it's with our hearts. The free kick was scary for me. Carlos Carlosia was on it but it went over so no big deal there in the end. 50 second minute I just wanted to note that City's pressing was really good here. You know I'm always taking note of mid block versus pressing versus sitting back and this was a good moment of pressing. So I was glad to see that. I don't want that to go away. Yeah I think it's worth calling out just because the pressing triggers are so obviously different under half or they were under carnal so I'm trying to figure out you know when the moment that they're going to press and when they're going to give that high pressure I think is interesting. Do you have you noted any of those trick triggers? Not like I know they're different but I don't know what the like I know one of them is like when they pass you know back to the keeper they're going to press high and like when you know they're trying to play through the center backs but sometimes they they drop into the passing lanes as well so it's not always said that high press all the time. Yes it's been I've enjoyed trying to catch all the triggers and all the moves and I'm still catching on again I bring that up so I can like make note of these kinds of things as I watch the game. A 53rd minute good passing on kind of a counter you know New England is retreating to some extent. Long bouncing ball in the rain from Vrioni I'm sorry this is New England's counter. Birky bobbled it that was like a weird one and it seems like the rain is having a play here. Vrioni was smart to kind of put some movement and a bounce on it so that was scary but it was fine. Yeah it was like kind of pouring at this stage. I think I didn't talk about it half but like when they're coming back from half it's our sport and you just see everyone like sprinting up the concourse to get into the covered areas. Yeah it was a decent crowd and then my wife asked me how the crowd was I was like well it's raining now so let's not judge it based on what it looks like. I think they usually do have a good crowd. Foxborough such a cavernous stadium like it always doesn't do the crowd justice for how many people are there you know. 55th minute luven misses on Holster defending him and he kind of has to file him so luven gets a yellow there if I'm not mistaken. 56th minute Klaus is on for horn and this is where we start seeing the big change. Taylor Twelman for my taste was beating this tease into submission like clearly heard from Hackword that this might happen and he just could not be quiet about it but it didn't happen at the half like he wanted and maybe it would have been a good idea to put him in at the half but just to give you the formation I'll let you comment on it Justin at this point we go three in the back center Winsky Kessler and Hubert are the center backs Horn is off which I was a bit surprised that because he's played center back. So rewarding nor Winsky here again Thor, luven, Durkin and Hartle across the midfield so that's Thor and Hartle kind of playing wing back roles slash midfielder roles. Torquert and Detcher are sitting in as tens as I saw it and it seemed like Tom Twelman back that a class seemed to be the highest player. Yeah and you know ask Hackword about this too because in my mind this was like a change to because of how the spacing was going and just a change of formation but do your Hackword say this was more just to get Klaus and the attacking players on the pitch and just like not having the flexibility to put on another center but can make those changes so and then Klaus kind of pushing forward I think does open up a lot of that space and behind that that takes advantage of as we'll see later. Yes well said I was going to say the same thing so we'll continue on 57th minute possession around the box again at least to a shot that hit the post this one hurt me even though yeah yeah it was the best opportunity of the game I think I mean it was I don't know I like yeah you see him you know coming down and taking that shot like you're kind of expecting it just to be the keeper yes yes yeah and I guess in a way it did be the keeper who knows if you would have gotten to it if it was on goal but again this is you know like I said New England is hunkered in St. Louis is passing around the box and in the past this is just like a non-issue nothing's gonna happen or yeah rarely happen and this is Klaus coming in showing his quality being just a striker doing just striker things turning and shooting very dangerous good move could have been a goal but it hit the post I like to see yeah I think we'll see kind of later on you know as they're kind of building up pressure that there like wasn't really any like hesitation and taking shots from distance as well in this tip test of the keeper that way too which I kind of like does a you know trying different things and you'll see what works and you know I live in as the shot from like way out that I think is just like nailed and if they aims it a little bit more to one side or the other it's a goal but yeah yes it's interesting loved that one 58th minute another yellow I didn't note who it was in this case but it was yet another tactical foul yeah and I thought they were all pretty well deserved for St. Louis ones 61st minute more great passing some panicky defending ooh I don't know what I said there but Louven had a wide angle but a hard shot on goal this is the one you're talking about I think the one that was from a distance really good shot could have gone in yeah and like this is you know the moment before that second goal it just felt like you know that they deserved a goal from like this pressure they after like 10 minutes leading up to it 15 minutes yeah really like after a half you know the new players Hackworth clearly working on this kind of thing this being the biggest improvement in St. Louis and I think we can't take it for granted because yes there have been some defensive problems but we got to remember that that's also come with a lot of improvement in the attack so you know finding that balance improving in the right ways again this is kind of a second early season you know for St. Louis with all the additions yeah um I lost my place great commentary on oh yes on this counter this is something to watch you know for the Thor haters you're going to enjoy this there was a counter attack with Thor on the ball and there were numbers for St. Louis and the center back for New England Romney had to choose who to cover and I think most people would have covered the ball the guy with the ball being Thor he chose to cover up the past to Klaus and force Thor to do something with it and you know he did some math right there kind of added up everyone's talent and chose someone and he made the right choice right Thor didn't quite make the right decision there not that this one was terrible but there are some bad ones to come yeah he just needs to be less selfish I think and like you wonder if it's like maybe a little bit of being gun shy from like previous matches but yeah yeah there are a couple moments here where you just wanted to like really put his butt through it speaking of being selfish here's when we should have been more selfish in the 67th second minute amazing passing just like cutting through quick passing Klaus to Thor it was like beautiful reverse pass kind of at the top of the box Thor isn't up to his credit in a perfect position almost offside not quite wide open and Klaus was good enough to get him the ball there which was incredible should have shot the ball and he tried to kind of send it gently way too gently backwards to bet you're kind of running on but kind of covered ball gets defended out that was really frustrating yeah that's one that yeah especially with the amount of pressure they had you're kind of expecting that to at least be played in direction of the keeper yes yeah just smash it right yeah right easy for us to say but yeah just be a little selfish you know put it on that that's all I'm asking. 64th minute Barrero is well defended by Jake Nowinski he probably got some hate from people but I wanted to point out something he did really well in that situation he had no help on that one he did a great job 65th minute all comes in for Toikert so Thor moves to the left all is on the right in wingback rolls and just immediately all is forced to defend and there's like Jake almost stepped forward to defend the guy but he really wanted all him to come over and defend him because it was a little bit outside 1v1 and it was the right choice Jake told him what to do all listened and all did a good job you know it was defended out also a note in this change heart will move central I think and we still have Klaus at the highest point and Simon better supporting him any thoughts on this bit of a change you know the good defensive work from all and Jake in this situation all having to play a defensive role to some extent yeah and like all I'm coming on the right throwing Thor over the left I thought it was interesting just to see kind of where half work prefers these guys when they're all healthy I think it's important to note for future reference yeah and we'll do a few more of these and I think we'll talk about just looking good right 66 minute luven shoots from distance again good on goal good save eight save of the match at this point for Ivachitch of note so you know stuff is going toward goal again new England gives up a lot of shots but a lot of these are looking very good at this point not like early in the game 67th minute luven sends it to the back post to Klaus it's well defended but Klaus was very dangerous this is another reason we're very happy to have Klaus doing number nine things yeah because even when like I think you know Klaus gets a lot of blacks sometimes for just like not scoring but the stuff that he does and just like opening up space and pushing that line forward I think is so crucial especially kind of to this game you can see like when he's back healthy you know impact well it's gonna be yeah and you know we see luven kind of dropped to that like just outside the box to either side and crossing the ball across to the back post having Klaus back we're gonna get a goal from that I think by the end of the season or early season for sure if Klaus and luven stay healthy because it's just bread and butter at this point for him another one it's a corner after that Thor heads it it gets headed a million times in a row but Thor is the one that gets to head it on to Kessler who's wide open in a similar shot spot to Thor Kessler to his credit shoots it right it goes wide but you know good positioning Thor doing something good um and just not getting in goal 70th minute drop-off for Parker this is a weird one I just wanted to note it that it was a the ref got hit by the ball and he drops the ball for Parker and in a drop ball it's open for anyone and Parker just kind of sat on it like it was a free game waiting for whistle and Klaus tried to take it like if the rules were absolute rules like Klaus had been able to steal that but you know it's it's not good games necessarily depending on how you look at it so I do kind of love it but yeah well done Klaus um 70 second minute pass forward with some mental passes forward hardle kind of sloppily passes it to Klaus but it bounces and lands to bet you're kind of at the top of the box him running hard arriving late as a 10 rather than a nine this is kind of what you were saying Justin hard and low and it's a goal it's 2-2 at this point yeah and just like like you said you know Klaus opens up that space so that you can run in behind it and just get on that ball I kind of asked him like afterwards why he feels like this run has been so successful for me you know his big thing was just everyone's kind of working it on the assumption that like the hard work will eventually pay off with kind of these results and I think this is a result of betcher's hard work of just like getting to that spot and that later I've around playing a little bit out of position of what you know he's been since arriving in St. Louis it's a good goal you know another funny thing of note is the time sub rule that I love this is MLS you know I hate on MLS all the time these rules need to be implemented everywhere in the world and they're the first to do it you um if you don't make it in off of your sub in time you were penalized 60 seconds and what I had forgotten is it's not just the 60 seconds but after the 60 seconds happens you have to wait for stoppage to come back in like uh not like an injury you have to actually not a fan of this after the match yeah hey love it we're gonna talk about him maybe being right and understandably being angry yeah suck it Caleb this is a good rule and I love and it resulted in the goal they were down a man you know you could argue that this gave St. Louis a goal and you know St. Louis especially when we're at home it just feels like we constantly have people wasting time to try to you know win a game and so it just feels good for this to happen yeah I just have the awareness I think like you said that man down probably is the reason why the goal just because the space that betcher is able to run into is maybe not there if you know all 11 players are on the pitch but yeah give Angela what's given to you just a couple more and then it kind of the game just slowly dies um in the last 10 minutes I didn't make too many notes there but in 74th minute there's a good turnover and a pass from Thor to betcher it was defended out I didn't make notes I don't remember whether that was really well done or not um in the 79th minute Klaus gets a turnover awesome turnover it makes a great play heartled to Durkin um but the shot was a great save uh this was another great save from Yvachish yeah this is the point where like it feels like they're just pressuring and pressuring but Yvachish is like at this point seems like he's not gonna get beat again maybe we can empathize with you know how people feel about Berkey on a weekly basis in this in this case that's all I could think is like this must be one of us feel like to to play against Berkey where you feel like you've gone enough to win yes um so you know props to him for having a good game even though it hurts us quite a bit um a foul it's heartel versus sands in the box and this oh yeah so we got to go on and on about this so the handball happens with hebert and the play just goes on it's noted and they're a bit surprised oh maybe that wasn't called they're not going to call that handball but then the ball gets to the other side and st louis has it in new england's box heartel scores a goal after like bodying sands off the ball um and he scores a goal starts celebrating and they kind of bring him back um and so you think oh they're gonna check that foul of heartel versus sands and then all of a sudden they start talking about oh no they're gonna go look at this handball from hebert but yeah like my whole thing on this play because like obviously like you can only go back and look at it in the savage player right and like there's just so much going on here the players oh we asked them about afterwards we're like pretty sure that they're looking at the foul to see if like you know it was a good goal and like the fact that the offside flag comes up and Joe Dixon like doesn't blow his whistle right away so like heartel is about to get a yellow but like taking the shirt off in celebration which if that's the goal he probably takes but then so they go back they look at the handball which is like I think is a handball I don't know like if the current interpretation of the rules how you can say that that wasn't a handball but you know I'm not going to complain in this moment um I think Kayla Porter is maybe a little bit justified to be maybe he goes a little bit overboard but a little bit justified to be angry about this this call yeah absolutely and it's like like I said earlier on one hand I prefer it to not get called and you know I'll take it in this situation too because he wasn't like outright trying to change the play with his hand it was an accident but it was out of a natural position and so on one hand yeah I love the no call but it was a handball it's gonna be like we'll be called a handball in every single game this year if it were to happen 10 times based yeah it's like we talked about earlier Phil it's like in my in an ideal world that's not a handball because it's not necessarily like any there's no intent there but like without the rules right now without majority like 95 cents that's called the handball so yeah yeah you don't know what they're what they're looking at well let's get to if Peter uh sorry Kayla Porter made some you know big statements I'll cut it down to one little paragraph here and you guys will understand the rage that was just being spit here by Kayla after the game his last kind of statements were on the topic I've never seen anything like it Porter continued the referee was a complete coward in that moment complete coward and it was a travesty he shouldn't officiate he cost our players two points today two really important points and I'm not going to stand for it I don't care if I get fine I don't care what MLS commissioner Don Garber says what Don Garber needs to do is look at that situation look at the official in that situation and needs to be held accountable on the in this situation uh boy those are really strong words he's very angry but I think we agree it's like it's righteous anger right yeah bringing up Don Garber's name uh yeah I mean it's it's you know he's okay to be this bad I think if I was a coach in this situation I'd be understandably like spewing uh maybe a little bit overboard not by me so you know you might get a fight for this one I think it was unfortunately more rancy than it should have been I cut out a bunch of other you know word you know salad but um and you know it's assuming that they make the pen uh it's a lot of assumptions there on the drop point test like yeah uh I heard some comments about what Berkey would have done in that situation none of them were positive but you know right there was a chance are you saying that he hasn't saved up penalty ever is that is that what they're saying you said it not me you said it not me um so yeah in the broadcaster saying things like this could change the rev season to back up porter you know like absolutely that could be a season changing decision season changing so a big deal they're in the same spot as us 13th in their division trying to make the playoffs granted they have a lot of games in hand compared to us so um a couple more things I'll rush through these because I want to just kind of talk about some of the stats at the end here uh talking about tim betcher being all over the place top five and distance covered in the game 86 minute read comes on for betcher and Thor kind of moves central and read kind of takes his position on the left I think scion betcher just in general has been such like an unsung hero for a guy that you maybe weren't expecting a ton from in that alone um but he's been like so affected every match it's been nice to hear us pundits say how good he's been yeah unexpectedly so um great we got a couple charts here with stats um I thought we'd look at this passing diagram and um anything you see from this uh we're seeing I mean it changed a lot so what we're seeing here actually doesn't well represent the second half necessarily like I noticed this last week too the partnerships between the centerbacks and the fullbacks and birdie I think especially the last half of the weeks have been very strong um you know I think at times this year really is making her voice known about it but I think at times this year you've seen that connection not be so clear and especially as they're trying to kind of figure out positioning and moving the ball around um I think that's a positive in terms of that like outer shell I agree uh but you know it looking at the goals the xg it just felt like a game that St. Louis deserved to win as far as performance as far as the attack I'm like yeah and you feel like defensively they only allowed like 0.01 expectations on target in second half and like anytime you have that strong it was showing defensively in a game that's like a close game I think you know more often than not you're winning that game yep especially 20 shots to 11 nine shots on goal four I mean come on um a lot of good stuff there um yeah I talked about it a little bit in my article this week about like how if this is earlier in the season and they aren't in such a crunch just to like win out basically you're probably looking at this in a positive way as opposed to like with a little bit of dread because time is just simply running out yes yeah possession 55% to 44 that's all good um clearly new england forest St. Louis to possess the ball but they were able to do enough with it to force new england to not just sit back and wait um aerial duels nine and nine just to kind of put a cherry on top of that conversation yeah yeah and you know like yesterday had a couple moments like outside of that corner too and on other side pieces where they're he's kind of targeted using his height in the box to their advantage another thing of note uh nine saves by the overnight only two for brookie so interesting so he just really good asks do a lot and especially on those like shots from distance I think a lot of times just because it's like if you look at statistically it's not gonna show up as much but like those saves on the shots and distance I think are more impressive than they're sometimes given credit for we'll close it with this looking at the defensive chart we're seeing you know 30 clearances from the revs versus 16 um the lock passes 15 on the revs side a lot of tactics from St. Louis and you look at where the defensive actions are happening yeah a lot of it's in the midfield and a decent spattering in you know the attacking third for St. Louis so the pressing is still happening but we're seeing a lot more density of the defensive actions in the middle and in the box yeah it's this like we kind of talked about earlier with those like different pressing triggers that they're sometimes looking to talk about the way and as opposed to just being like sort of fun so always running at the goal of people always running at the back line yes i've been really brave and it's been amazing thank you so much for joining us did you want to say anything else before we go Justin or no i would say like uh like i said earlier i think it's you know one of those things where if you're allowed to zoom out a little bit of this game and like if they're doing it a little bit more positive as opposed to like now you're looking at it as an opportunity of drop points from a leading position again when you score the first goal all right so we're gonna call it absolutely thank you for making it this far guys hopefully i got some of that edited out but some of it is just unavoidable literally has been amazing thank you Justin bye Lou yeah thanks guys next time in see yep i will just put a chair you know close up the rest of this um you know i think the only thing we didn't cover i apologize to you guys for that being the way it was but i'm so glad we were able to get a fallout in um it has been a crazy couple of weeks with matt being so busy um all of us still have our crazy schedules that we've cut back on and so just fitting in a show it all has been really difficult and so i hope you guys are good with uh going with this one um i think the last thing i wanted to mention that things for us to kind of think about as we leave here is looking at the first half what it looked like things to improve on like we said do we need to tighten up the defense and which way do we tighten it up more pressing more mid-block more you know absorbing of pressure in and around the box what does that look like and how do we tighten that up all the way as the rest of the season goes through playoffs probably over question mark um can this tightening up happen well enough to make the playoffs do we care anymore do we just focus on improving and uh making sure that that's good for next year i think that's where my brain is kind of automatically going with just a glimmer of hope in the back in the background and lastly first half versus second half three in the back looks so dangerous and was there much of a drop-off defensively how much of that was new england revolution um not pushing and how much of that was st louis putting so much pressure on and still being able to defend with three in the back so just things to think about stuff that i'm going to kind of wake up in the middle of the night wanting to think about and um you know that's where i find the fun is to kind of argue about these kinds of things so let's have these conversations playoffs are not there's still a lot of interest to be had here so um again thanks for making it to the end of this show it's fly over fall out we're fly over footy is the podcast of course we are presented by noble ice vineyards thank you for joining us matt's back after this guys thank the heavens you're gonna get all your detailed data all your detailed stats being used in a way that i know you guys really appreciate for matt i hope you guys have enjoyed us filling in and doing our best to keep up with him um we'll talk to you next time enjoy! so so if you like the show please take a moment to 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