Analysis: Minnesota United still left looking for more controlled movement on offense

It’s an axiom that getting a point on the road in soccer is always a good thing. Minnesota United took not one but three points at San Jose on Saturday night, so in the end, no one is going to be that disappointed with the result.

That said, the Loons had plenty of chances to ease the blood pressure of fans who stayed awake for the West Coast encounter, instead of making everyone involved sweat out a 1-0 victory.

The numbers say the three best chances in the match all came for Minnesota United, all after Kelvin Yeboah had given the Loons the lead in the 32nd minute. Yeboah, Morris Duggan and Bongokuhle Hlongwane all had one-on-one chances against San Jose goalkeeper Daniel, but none of the three could convert.

It was notable that the three chances came from each of the three ways that the Loons have been able to create offense this season. Yeboah’s chance was straight from a long ball over the top from Duggan. Duggan’s came after a recycled set piece. And Hlongwane won the second ball after a long ball out of the defense was headed away, passed to Robin Lod, then got a return pass that slipped him in for a shot — a textbook example of how the Loons want to go long, win a second ball and create a chance.

Coach Eric Ramsay, though, isn’t happy with the Loons just being a team that can score from set pieces and the ol’ “route one” of the long ball over the top.

“I felt like we almost let ourselves down a little bit in the middle, in how easily we turned the ball over and how desperate we were to play forward,” he said.

Ramsay said that at halftime he pulled out a video clip from the first half showing midfielders Wil Trapp and Hassani Dotson connecting short passes with the defense, then turning and passing to attacking midfielder Lod.

It was in the hope of showing the Loons that it was, in fact, possible for them to move the ball down the field in a controlled way, rather than solely looking for quick-strike counterattacks.

“Obviously, we’re a very good counterattacking team,” he said. “We’ve got players that want to play forward quickly and run forward in threes, fours, fives, with real intensity and pace. But we can’t do that every time we have the ball.”

Through three games, San Jose had the lowest possession numbers of any MLS team, with the Loons second lowest. After Saturday night, when San Jose completed nearly 350 passes more than Minnesota did (514-166), the Earthquakes zoomed all the way up to 22nd in MLS.

“We’ve got forwards that want to attack the goal, it’s as simple as that, so I want to make sure we play to those strengths,” Ramsay said. “But there is a fine line you tread there. And I felt like we certainly overdid that in the first half, and we looked forward far too often and it almost felt like we had to score on every attack, whereas I felt like it called for real balance today.”

The sportswriter Austin Murphy once referred to late-night red-eye flights as “the business traveler’s equivalent of slaking one’s thirst with seawater.” In past seasons, the Loons have taken their fair share of saltwater gulps.

This year, the plan is to make sleep a priority.

MLS Western Conference teams not on the West Coast now have to play a minimum of seven road games in the Pacific Time Zone, with the addition of San Diego. This was the first of four of those this season for the Loons that are slated to start at 9:30 p.m. Central Time.

Minnesota traveled to San Jose on Thursday, so that the Loons could practice on grass Friday instead of their own indoor artificial turf, making for a long weekend away for the whole squad. But though it meant less Sunday family time, the Loons chose to get some sleep in the Bay Area on Saturday night, rather than hurrying back — and starting the week exhausted.

“We’ve been away for a long time this week, and I’m desperate to get back and see the little ones,” said Ramsay, who — like a number of his players — has very young kids at home. “But if I get back at 4 or 5 a.m., or if there’s a delay, then I’m not the same person as I normally am on that Sunday.”

At 33, Ramsay is the youngest coach in MLS, which also means that he’s at the same life stage as many of his players and can understand on a personal level the tradeoff that is being made, to rest rather than rushing back to town.

“I feel like, for the betterment of the group, it’s in our interest to stay over and put ourselves in a better position come Monday when we regroup,” he said.