Wasatch Soccer Sentinel
Mother nature showed up in full force to celebrate the arrival of the new “Peak Utah” kit, in a game where the weather was more or less also peak Utah.
Wind, thunder, snow… thundersnow?
It’s a bit tricky to identify what tangibles you can take from a match like this and actually apply to the knowledge bank as anything credible. In elements like these, something along the lines of “xDawg” probably takes on a more important role than anything the pre-game X’s and O’s had planned for. Still, there were 11 players for both teams (for most of the match), a glorious orange ball, and two goals on either side of the pitch. The result did matter, so what can we take from it?
The tactical highlight coming into this one was that Matt Crooks would be occupying the 10 spot from the start. Now three matches into the 4-2-3-1, it was probably about time to let him have a go in light of a few benign performances from Ruiz. Here I think we can gleam the most from the match, given that in the first 45, not only was the snow still somewhat manageable, but Crooks was actively involved in a number of plays going forward. While generally unsuccessful, he played quite a few risky through balls behind the opposition back line in search of a weak point. The one time he pulled it off to great success led to a Gómez goal that was barely called back for offsides. It’s worth noting that most of these attempts were intercepted beforehand, but it’s refreshing enough to see someone in that role looking for those killer balls often.
