i got five on it: pollock, mondrian, coach ken, and white men being weird

Apologies in advance, but when stunning goals happen it awakens the amateur poet inside me, and this week there were two. Orlando has also been getting a lot of credit, largely, and not wrongly, due to Barbra Banda’s recent performances. But they’ve been building something sinister for a while, and that part isn’t getting talked about enough, so I did.

As far as the bad, well yeah, that weird Willie Kirk interview had a lot of bad, plus NWSL stoppage time and Manchester United’s new primary decision maker revealing his priorities.

Let’s get into, starting with the good.

The Good Shit

Orlando Thee Pride

The Pride missing the playoffs last year seemingly made a few people ho and hum about the progress they were making, despite Gotham being the team that kept them out by a point. Orlando hit the Cam Newton GIF and proceeded with their plans. They signed smartly, and aimed high to secure Barbra Banda.

The Pride have won six games in a row and are tied atop the table with the wildin out Kansas City Current. During this stretch, which began on April 12, the Pride have a .9 non-penalty xG difference and are generating 1.6xG per 90.

A lot of their xG has come from Barbra Banda, who needed approximately twelve nanoseconds to adjust to the NWSL. While Banda certainly takes the team to the next level, it’d be a miscalculation to assume that the Pride are Banda FC. As a defensive unit, the Pride have been as impressive and as effective at punishing opponents, leading the NWSL in allowing the lowest xG per 90, just .68.

This is a complete team with very few weaknesses, one of the most electric attacking talents in soccer, a shoulda-been 2023 MVP candidate in Adriana, and several young players coming into their own, and tactically fluid.

PSG v. Paris FC, playoffs

Despite the reputation the French have for hating everything that is American, D1 Arkema have instituted a playoff at the end of their regular season. The semifinal round included Lyon beating Reims 6-0, and the more interesting tie being an all Parisian scrap between PSG and Paris FC.

Here’s how it went:

• 36’: 1-0 Paris FC (Matéo)

• 52’: 1-1 PSG (Geyoro, pen)

• 56’: 2-1 Paris FC (Corboz)

• 72’: 2-2 PSG (Katoto)

And true to the very heart of peak woso, it ended with a tense penalty shootout. The extended match highlights are ten minutes long but if you missed the game I highly suggest watching it all, it was an absolute banger.

Olivia Moultrie’s Goal

This goal is illustrative of what I love about this sport. If you strip everything away it’s just kicking a ball around, but that’s the beauty. It’s a perfectly simple canvas, and what’s created is up to the talent, skill, creativity, intelligence, and collaboration of the players.

In this instance, Moultrie opted to wrangle laws of nature to bewilder Laurel Ivory. The reverse view shows just how evil this strike is. My favorite part is how the ball looks as if it shifts into another gear mid flight and steers itself into the side netting. In the end Moultrie just kicked the ball, but midway through its journey it became sentient, and knew what it was to live.

Ella Stevens’ Goal

Wrangling or bending physics always reveals the poetry in the game, but the game is so expansive that Pollock and Mondrian can exist simultaneously. This strike from Stevens is the latter.

One of the things I love about center forward play is how they can construct a goal in their mind before it happens. No one else on the pitch knows, but they move as if every step is predetermined.

As soon as this ball floated toward Stevens she knew she was going to touch it down with her left, spin, and pile drive it on the half volley with her right. She executes both touches perfectly, and the result deserves placement in The Louvre.

Thorns leaning into Coach Kenough

Honestly, this one is just for me. I am extremely silly and enjoy when other join in my silliness. The bleached blonde hair of Portland’s interim head coach, Rob Gale, gives him a hilarious resemblance to Ryan Gosling’s ‘Ken’ from the Barbie movie.

Some see Draco Malfoy, and that’s fine and sorta funny too, but Coach Kenough is hilarious, and I appreciate that the Thorns’ social admin is embracing it.

Ugh, Why Tho?

Willie Kirk’s interview

Former Leicester City head coach Willie Kirk was recently dismissed from his role after an investigation into a romantic relationship with a player. It should be common sense that this sort of thing shouldn’t happen, but for some reason in women’s soccer it’s too common an occurrence.

For some reason, Kirk decided that after one (1) month it was time to make his side of the story public, and sat down for an interview with Kathryn Batte of Mail Sport.

The quote in the tweet suggests the piece is full of introspection and accountability, however the exact opposite seemed true across the bulk of his direct quotes. Kirk apparently believes Leicester should’ve ‘stood by’ him due to the team’s improved performance, as if results entitle you to one (1) fuck up of this proportion.

There’s clearly a lot of fear speaking, and to an extent, understandably so. Kirk has had a long tenure and largely positive reputation in the women’s game. But good performances and goodwill don’t really work like tokens in an RPG. What should be more important, and what Kirk clearly needed more time to understand, is that accountability and introspection on what led to him making such a poor decision would go further than pointing at his resume and shouting ‘but everyone else is doing it’ like a toddler at recess.

My other frustration with this is how Kirk is separating who is to blame, and his audience. He’s certainly blaming Leicester for not standing by him, but in the interview he also blamed the player and her supposed relentless pursuits of him. This also tips off the audience Kirk is peaking to: men. Particularly, men with power in the women’s game.

This interview is an unartful attempt to shift the focus from his actions and how it embedded danger and distrust among the players he was in charge of coaching, and instead talk to The Guys™ by framing his choices as reasonable (she insisted), understandable (this happens a lot), and not that bad (I’m not a criminal).

NWSL’s excessive stoppage time is dangerous

PRO referees had a come to Jesus/Buddha/Beyoncé moment about their painfully slow use of VAR and have seemingly instituted better processes to solve it. This is good, and appreciated. But now they need to turn their attention to the exorbitant amount of stoppage time being tacked onto every game.

This is a sport with a running clock, and naturally there are moments when play will not be happening while seconds tick away. That’s fine. No one really has the expectation that players should be doing as close to 90 minutes of running as possible, it is not a cross-country meet, it is a soccer game.

The dark art of time wasting can be a problem, but that’s what yellow cards are for. Beyond that, referees are punishing players for their own lengthy VAR reviews, injuries, and substitutions. Stoppage time is meant to be a reasonable number, not an exact one.

It’s seemingly become common for first and second half stoppage time to combine for a 15-20 extra minute of play, which is an extra time period every single match. This is not conducive to a long season, player safety, or incoming summer heat.

These minutes add up as well. If players are consistently playing an addition fifteen minutes over 24 regular season games, they will accrue an addition four 90s in their legs over the course of the season. What’s worse is that the bulk of these 90s will be played by players at, near or beyond peak fatigue. If they insist on continuing with this it will negatively impact games at the end of the regular season and in the playoffs, and likely results.

Man United’s new ownership continuing to not care about its women’s team

Jim Ratcliffe and INEOS have apparently finally taken control of Manchester United and have given lip service to the idea of bringing both teams back to the standard that made Yung Jimmy Boy a fan in the first place.

Since, he, and the club, have made decisions that question the seriousness of that claim as it applies to the women’s team. While they were battling to secure their first major trophy in an FA Cup Final at Wembley – something so important Nikita Parris sacrificed £1-million for – Ol’ Jimmy Rats was at Old Trafford watching his men’s team lose a regular season match against Arsenal.

You may be thinking, ‘no worries, don’t teams always do a club awards dinner or something where they all dress up and have an emcee and it’s all black tie and whatnot, surely he can just congratulate them there.’ Except Manchester United cancelled the club’s awards ceremony and apparently forgot to notify the women’s team, so they all found out via social media.

Foolishness.

Houston finally wins a second game, talks shit again

As a person with a somewhat spicy social media presence, I get it. Talk your shit. In fact, I used to live by the ethos that you shouldn’t be a loud hater until after your team plays and doesn’t embarrass you. I have changed my mind, because the jokes always come for you, and passing on a chance to hate is simply not living right.

Using a line from Kendrick Lamar – Compton’s own Kendrick Lamar – to troll the team from Angel City is an elite bit of spiciness that I would be here for from any other club. However, the last time the Dash won a game, which was March 30th, their social media admin got similarly spicy and the club’s best player immediately demanded a trade.

Social media admins of bad teams and team performances have a hard job. I just hope the tweet doesn’t come back to haunt them the way the first one did.

Vivianne Miedema leaving Arsenal

Gotta sting to be the one white women Jonas Eidevall doesn’t want.

Nah but for real, Miedema is a club legend and it’s very weird that this is how it’s ending. It’s also very weird that it seems like Eidevall can’t find a way to fit her in his scheme or style of play.

The frustrating part is that Miedema and Arsenal had been here before: her contract running down, rumors swirling and Arsenal fans panicking, but it’s always resulted in another extension. This was a player so fun, smooth and full of goals that Barcelona chased her across multiple windows, yet she stayed.

Her very ill-timed ACL injury and lengthy recovery derailed her career just as she was entering her prime, but the wild thing is that she’s still just 27 (28 in July). The rumor is that she’s heading up north to join Manchester City, which is also not how her exit was supposed to go.

Losing club legends is always tough, but after several takes and plausible scenarios, Arsenal somehow chose one of the worst ways to close the door on a beloved and long-serving player.