Cleveland 1 – Impact 2
By: Franck |
2 Comments
This should have been easier than that. At times, it seemed like the Impact were falling asleep on the field, and thus letting the City Stars get too close to the goal.
I can’t say that I enjoy watching a soccer match on an american football field. I’m sure the players don’t enjoy it playing on it much either, especially the Impact, used to playing on their real grass field at Saputo Stadium. The ball bounces more than on a real pitch, and it seems to me that it slows the pace a bit.
Keeper Srdjan Djekanovic got the start. Head coach Marc Dos Santos started with a 4-3-3 formation, with Joqueviel and Pesoli as central defenders, Braz and Zanzan as laterals, Gatti, Di Lorenzo and Ciaran O’Brien in the midfield, and Biello, Brown and Byers up front. I feel that Zanzan needs to play more, because every time he makes a start after not having played for a while, his playing appears confused and sloppy. Patrick Leduc made his first appearance in over a year in the 71st minute.
Brown put one in the back of the net in the 23rd minute off a cross from Byers. Gueye, off a corner in the 37th minute, put it past Djekanovic. Brown scored again in the 69th, heading Di Lorenzo’s center.
That three more points in the bank, and unless Miami wins tonight, we’re assured to make the playoffs. Will we face the Railhawks, the Battery or the Islanders???
Category: Montreal Impact Team News
Impact 1, Railhawks 0
By: Franck | 1 Comment
Yellow Cards to the left, yellow cards to the right! Oh, what an orgy of cards!
That’s what happens when the ref loses control of his match. As if Sunday’s match, involving the same two teams in the same stadium, wasn’t aggressive enough, the ref had to let the violence continue by A) not making all the calls and B) letting things degenerate as the game wore on. 9 yellows were given, two to Pizzolitto, who, by all accounts, should be suspended for another match (he’s already missing next Wednesday’s match against Vancouver) After several un-sportsmanlike tackles, a few elbows to the head, some shoving, Railhawks head coach Martin Rennie got tossed for kicking a water bottle at the 4th official.
The nice thing is, these two teams meet again on September 18 in Cary, and it’s entirely possible that these two teams might face each other in the playoffs. Now that would be sweet.
Leonardo Di Lorenzo scored a highlight reel goal in the 11th minute, taking a cross from Adam Braz which was poorly headed away by a Railhawks player and rifling it from inside the box into the top of the net, while keeper Eric Reed didn’t budge. That was the only marker of the match, as the Impact came away with a well-fought, if not particularily exceptional, victory. The Impact came out strong in the first fifteen, and then in the last minutes of the first half, but then sat on their heels in the second half, which was not aided by head coach Marc Dos Santos‘ decision to pull Rocco Placentino back a bit, then to sub out more offensive-minded Joey Gjertsen for Leighton O’Brien . The Impact didn’t give many offensive chances to Carolina, however, didn’t create many either.
I wish this team would try harder.
Impact 1 – Railhawks 1
By: Franck | Add Comments
It’s nice to lose 2 needed points on a clumsy defensive play, but I guess a point is better than a loss.
The team came out to play, but it seemed to me that it was quite difficult to get any real offense going. A well-placed kick from outside the box by Adam Braz was good enough for Tony Donatelli, who headed it in at the 33rd minute, but aside from that, very little dangerous offense was created by the Impact. Peter Byers made another start, but was hardly a threat offensively, while Roberto Brown had few chances to hand the ball over, thanks to some unimaginative play in the midfield by both Leighton O’Brien and Mauro Biello.
The Railhawks played tight defensively, and as expected, played a patient game offensively, waiting for Montreal to mess up, which they eventually did. The Railhawks put one past Matt Jordan in the 63rd after Stephen deRoux and, perhaps to a lesser degree Cédric Joqueviel, messed up defensively.
With Nevio Pizzolitto getting a sixth yellow, he’ll be out against Vancouver next week. That’ll let Stefano Pesoli play.
Wednesday we face the ‘hawks again. Hooray.
Category: Montreal Impact Team NewsPre-Game: Impact vs Railhawks
By: Franck | Add Comments
The first of two home games against the Carolina Railhawks. We haven’t played them yet this season, and it’s almost September. As my dear colleague Lee over at the Whitecaps Offside has stated in some posts a short while ago, the USL schedule is plainly fucked.
It is what it is, I suppose.
The Railhawks bring their 14-5-6 record to Stade Saputo. Good enough for second spot, they’ve also clinched a playoff birth. The Impact bring a 9-10-5 record, 3-2-0 in our last 5.
Our team is back in shape, with only Simon Gatti unavailable to play. It appears that the club is also in high spirits, thanks to some decent playing of late, as well as the healthy bodies. It’s certainly time to show some of the top clubs that we’re in it until the end, and I don’t mean just the regular season. We’re in the playoffs, and we’re gonna fight to stay alive.
This is what the remainder of the regular season looks like:
08/30 Carolina RailHawks @ IMPACT
09/02 Carolina RailHawks @ IMPACT
09/05 IMPACT @ Cleveland City Stars
09/09 Vancouver Whitecaps @ IMPACT
09/13 Minnesota Thunder @ IMPACT
09/18 IMPACT @ Carolina RailHawks
Category: Montreal Impact Team NewsImpact 2 – Cleveland 1
By: Franck | 4 Comments
Bear with me here folks, I’m feeling as giddy as a teenage girl.
We won! We like, totally, like, won! Peter Byers(making a totally rare start) scored! OMG really? And so did Mauro Biello?
We like, totally played awesomely. Cleveland just couldn’t match our overwhelming coolness. And anyway, our uniforms were like waaay more stylin’! Like, their tops didn’t match their shorts….ugh! As if! Did you guys see what Matt Jordan (in his second consecutive start) was wearing? A black uniform. I was like, no way! Gold uniforms are so passé.
So what’s the deal with that field anyway? Why was their like, American football lines on the pitch? That was sooo not cool. I’m sure that’s why only 1500 people showed up. And the ball kept bouncing, just like a bad cheque. That totally happened to Marsha’s dad, it was like so totally embarrassing for Marsha…OMG! Shut up! I know, I babble like a total loser!
Anyway, here’s the like, you know, scoring:
MON : P. Byers (Donatelli) 59′
CLE : J. Hotchkin (Stewart) 69′
MON : M. Biello (Di Lorenzo) 75′
As you can obviously see, we like, totally scored first. Then they scored, but we totally came back to win! It’s not like we played like champs or anything. I mean, our passing was kinda shotty, we couldn’t really produce anything spectacular in the like, you know, their end of the field, thanks to Eddie Sebrango playing like a total douche. We didn’t exactly play like there was a sale going on. Our guys were just strolling up and down the field…We could have and should have totally owned them, but we were like, OMG, so not in the mood. Besides, who wants to sweat? It’ll ruin their uniforms…
Austin is up next, and I hope we totally beat them too!
Luv you!
Category: Montreal Impact Team NewsPre-game: Impact @ Cleveland City Stars
By: Franck | Add Comments
Crucial points needed on Tuesday.
The Impact (7-10-5) travel to Cleveland to face the City Stars (2-14-7) for the second time this year. We beat them 4-1 at Saputo Stadium on July 22nd.
Matt Jordan will start a second consecutive match in goal.
Nevio Pizzolitto and Roberto Brown are out, having collected their fifth yellows last week.
It’s getting to that point of the season where fans like myself aren’t expecting too much out of our club. I don’t expect a miracle turnaround, I don’t expect us to suddenly become an offensive power, and if we’re lucky enough to make it to the playoffs, I honestly don’t expect us to get very far. I am, however, hoping that I’m wrong and suddenly our team shows some spark.
A good place to start would be another Cleveland whooping.
Category: Montreal Impact Team NewsImpact 0, Timbers 1: Fail
By: Franck | Add Comments
One tiny mistake and the Timbers ran off with 3 points.
Thanks to a defensive error on behalf of Simon Gatti and Cédric Joqueviel, the Impact conceded a late second-half goal in an otherwise perfect match defensively. Adam Braz kicked one scoring attempt on the goal line and made a few key tackles in a strong defensive showing by the Impact.
The offense, however, was pretty tame, showing hardly to danger as well as being constantly shut down by the Timbers’ well-organized defenders.
In the end, the better team, Portland, won. And lost defender Cameron Knowles for the rest of the season along the way.
Scoring:
POR : R. Pore (Forrest) 83′
Stats:
MON POR
Shots 9 14
Saves 7 2
Fouls 18 18
Off-sides 2 0
Corners 1 3
Next up is Puerto Rico on Sunday in Bayamon. We really need 3 points.
Category: Montreal Impact Team NewsBig important match: Timbers-Impact
By: Franck | Add Comments
Tonight’s a big match, folks: we face the USL-1 leaders Portland Timbers in the first game of the final third of the season. We’re one game under .500, at 7-8-5, with 22 Goals For and 23 Goals Against. The Timbers, on the other hand, are 11-1-9, with 32 GF and only 11 GA. This is the third and final meeting of the season between the two clubs. The Timbers beat us 4-0 in Portland and later beat us at home 1-0.
The Impact enter this match with only one loss in their last 6, a 0-1 loss on penalties to the Puerto Rico Islanders on July 19th.
Probable starters for the Impact:
Keeper: Djekanovic
Central D: Pizzolitto, Joqueviel
Lateral D: Braz, Gatti
Midfield : C.O’Brien, Testo, DiLorenzo
Strikers : Placentino, Brown, P-RMayard
Note that both Roberto Brown and Nevio Pizzolitto, who received their 5th yellow last game against the Minnesota Thunder last Sunday, will not miss tonight’s game, but will miss the game in Cleveland on Tuesday. Talk about being lucky. So aside from Gatti taking over for Zanzan, who is either injured or will be benched after an un-stellar yet not terrible performance versus Minnesota on Sunday, the Impact will field the same squad as the previous game, a squad which had numerous scoring chances against the Thunder but failed to capitalize on them, save for the winning goal. Let’s hope the Impact take that energy into tonight’s match.
I’d honestly prefer to see Pesoli in place of Gatti, but hey, I’m not the coach.
As usual, THE TEAM 990, USLlive.com (English) and CKAC Sports (French), have this game for you.
Category: Montreal Impact Team NewsImpact 1 – Minnesota 0
By: Franck | 5 Comments
We did it. We won. We beat the Minnesota Thunder.
We now stand alone in the 6th spot in USL-1, with ten games to play.
The Impact had a boatload of chances, missing most of them, but scoring one when it counted. Roberto Brown’s goal in the 51st minute was the decisive marker in a match where Minnesota showed very little on the D-side of things, and little more on the offensive side.
I tip my hat to the 3 forwards: Roberto Brown, Rudolph Mayard and Rocco Placentino. Brown played especially well, holding on to the ball and feeding it to his wingers, while Mayard and Rocco had numerous chances, the former hitting the crossbar in the first half, the latter firing a few on net while setting up a few more plays. I also liked Ciaran O’Brien’s play, once again.
Next up is Portland on Wednesday, at home, which should be a tough match. Hopefully we’ll once again see this better Impact squad, you know, the one that shows up to play.
Category: Montreal Impact Team NewsImpact 1 – River 1
By: Franck | 7 Comments
Well, we somehow tied River Plate.
In a Saputo Stadium full of Argetine fans, many of whom apparently made the trip from New York, and who braved the downpour. River fielded 8 6 out of 11 starters for this friendly, which lost a bit of pace due to the slippery conditions.
It rained like a bitch, really.
River didn’t appear, in my view, to be trying nearly as hard as they could, probably since this was just a friendly, under the cold rain and wind, and with the Argetinian Primera season being threatened, I suppose they didn’t really need to go all out. Montreal, however, played like they wanted to show the many fans that showed up that they could compete against better clubs, just like they did last week against Bordeaux. They got organized and had more scoring chances than River did in the second half. The Impact eventually lost in the shootout, 3-1, which, apparently was only for show.
The team apparently is boasting its success against this club, as head coach Marc Dos Santos‘ comments attest:
This is a historic match for Montreal. A tie against River Plate will remain in history. We are well, we are healthy and if we continue to act this way on the field, we will win our games. We were consistently well organized on defense and dangerous around the goal. We now simply need to capitalize on our occasions.
…and beat teams that really don’t inspire much, Marc.
It seems to me that the Montreal Impact play well when they’re heavily the underdog. That or this club has definitely outgrown USL. Tired of playing in front of 1000 fans, the Impact would much rather face some tough CONCACAF competition, or some of the world’s biggest clubs. And what club wouldn’t? Of course, the club has to remember to play to win every match. You can’t really outgrow a league unless you completely dominate it, which, as it stands right now, we don’t.
Roberto Brown played like he should, being the anchor for the offensive side, and having wingers to pass the ball to. He did his job well last night, also netting our goal in a clumsy affair inside River’s box.
Argentinan and Impact player Leonardo Di Lorenzo, motivated by playing against a club from his native country, played his heart out, played as if he had something to proove, and turned out to be the player of the match. As he put it:
It was exciting to play against an Argentinean team. We tied the game after playing a good game and that is the most important thing. We showed that we can play against a team of any level. If we play like today in our league matches, we’ll do well.
Indeed. I wonder, however, if he was playing his heart out because he wants to show his fellow countrymen that he has what it takes for the Argentine league? I wonder…He’s been rather quiet this season.
It was also nice seeing Cédric Joqueviel back in the lineup in central defense next to Nevio Pizzolitto. Zanzan, for his part, seemed confused and late on the ball on a few occasions. Could the weather have been a factor? Does it rain much in Togo, I wonder?
Category: Montreal Impact Team News
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