Playing for Pride: Challenge Cup Week 4 vs Orlando

The Courage limp into their final Challenge Cup group stage match, needing a win to stay alive in hopes that Gotham FC drops points against Louisville on Sunday.

Last Time Out

The Courage recorded a nice 3–2 win against Louisville, continuing the trend of scoring and conceding far more than the average team.

Against the identified key metrics:

• Take 5 more shots with 3 more on target than Louisville: 8 more shots, 3 more on target
• Lynn Williams gets at least two shots inside the box: Lynn Williams took 6 shots with all but 1 inside the box
• 4 key passes from Debinha/Mace: Debinha had 3, but Mace came in late and did not record a key pass.
• Field tilt of 33%+ in opponent third and 25% or less in defensive third: Need to limit Louisville’s chances to create from the press. 35% of touches were in the attacking third. Still, 28 % of touches in the NC third and relatively few touches were in the middle meant for a very end to end game
• 55% possession in middle third and 45% in final third 47% possession in the final third, but only 53% in the middle third.
• Greater than 50% pass completion in the final third: 62% completion in the final third, NC’s best performance so far.

The big takeaway from the last game is that Lynn Williams is back and still capable of changing a game. Her ability to get involved was hugely improved from the game against Gotham. The spacing issues that plagued the NC attackers was mostly gone against Louisville.

The defense continues to have issues — this time CeCe Kizer was able to get open and play well as a target forward. This is compounded by Erceg’s injury (according to Riley, she will be out 2–3 more weeks) and now Speck’s injury will add to the problem.

Against Orlando

NC limps into the Orlando game with 3 defensive players out, and little depth to replace them. This is a must win game for NC; a draw means that Gotham automatically qualifies for the next round.

Orlando has struggled offensively, with just 2.7 xG over the course of their 3 games. Alex Morgan did well in her first game back, and between Morgan and Leroux there is no shortage of dangerous scorers in Orlando. The truth is that the weak point of the Courage matches up poorly against Orlando’s strengths.

Orlando has not played for possession, touching the ball the second least in the Challenge Cup so far. They will probably surrender the possession battle to NC, and let the Courage try to beat them before attacking on the break.

Key Metrics:

• No more than 6 shots between Morgan and Leroux: The Courage must work to deny these two the ball and force other Orlando players to make plays. Morgan and Leroux are great at getting into high quality spots and getting their chances on frame.
• 35% field tilt towards the attacking third, and less than 25% in the defensive third: Keeping the ball away from the Courage goal worked fairly well against Louisville and should work again against Orlando
• 6 Shots on target between Debinha/McDonald/Williams: The three have individually had their moments of danger but have not put together a game where all three are performing at the highest level
• 65 % completion in attacking and middle third combined: It is likely the Pride will give up possession, but even with the ball the Courage must make good and safe decisions and not let attacks turn into counters.