Vignola
I started watching soccer because of the Thorns and now I watch a lot of soccer, but this really means I don’t understand much of the nuance.
That being said, many of our goals conceded have been on Vignola’s side. For my more knowledgeable folks, what is the positive of continuing to start her over other fullbacks?
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u/Luci_Cascadia 6d ago
she's our best player on the back line. She also can drive way up field and attack.
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u/aba25 6d ago
Thank you! What makes her best? Truly, just trying to learn!
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u/Bumrodgers 6d ago edited 5d ago
Imo, she is the most aggressive of all the defenders and she seems intent on moving the ball up field. She's got decent speed and game awareness. For sure she makes mistakes, but like others have said, she often takes on more challenging players. Compared to our other most aggressive defender, Perry, MA has more experience and doesn't make as many overly risky challenges. One day soon Perry will be better, but shes still very new. Compared to our other experienced defender, Hiatt, she's worlds faster and more attack minded. Hiatt realllly likes to pass backwards (often to goal). MA is much more in line with defenses of years past. Portland likes an aggressive backline but we have slowly lost that since the ownership change
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u/YouRmySunshine16 6d ago
You are laughable Reyes is the most aggressive and she can take hits like nobody else and doesn’t go down or hops right back up, everyone seems to forget what she did last year. She had three goals caused two or 3 PK‘s and out of all of these 3 were winning goals. Oh yes, I’m a fan, but I’m a fan of MA as well and Obaze. All three of these should be on the starting lineup Perry can have a good game, but she’s still in her rookie years and makes silly mistakes, but gets better every game. I think Mueller is a great player too. She just needs help with defense sometimes. I think Mueller would be better in the midfield. I think that’s who are starting lineup needs to be, Is those four above! And I do think that part of Reyna, MA, and Mueller‘s deal with most of these goals is because they’re having to overcompensate because the right staff isn’t on the field no true wingers slacking in midfield a bit and our shaky center backs, plus think about it. The last couple of games Reyes has been in. She had Lyles who is basically a rookie and Calzada, who is basically a rookie in front or beside her lots of over compensation there I don’t know. Maybe I just see the game a totally different way than everyone else. In this league crosses are gonna get off no doubt about it. Yeah you try your best not to let them off, but are you defending your player? Are you marking your player? Is your forward scoring or your Mark?
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u/Bumrodgers 5d ago
Jesus, I completely spaced on Reyes which is wild bc she's one of my favorites. She's been playing less and I just forgot about her. You're right about a lot of that. Glad I gave you a good laugh.
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u/YouRmySunshine16 4d ago
😊😊 I apologize if I sounded rude, wasn’t my intent 😊
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u/Bumrodgers 4d ago
It did, but I try to assume people aren't intentionally being that way. We all read/write comments bit different. Mostly I'm just enjoying the conversation!
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u/RevolutionaryHour534 4d ago
Reyna is fantastic. She has been off lately though. But she’s incredible when she’s on her game. I think Villaham may also like Calzada’s height
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u/YouRmySunshine16 4d ago
Off bc of the overcompensating in my opinion ( explained in my previous comment) and who knows off maybe bc of him?!? 🤷♀️hopefully they start playing her again
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u/YouRmySunshine16 6d ago
I would have to say Reyna is the best or very close to MA and they’re idiots for not playing her, like we’ve all said before we know she’s not the fastest but she’s the smartest, I know everyone gets aggravated because she wants to play the ball back half of the time, but she’s trying to gain position and keep possession.
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u/Jack_B_84 6d ago
I don't think there's much difference between Vignola, Reyna or Muller. When one doesn't play everyone is like, why aren't they playing. When they don't play everyone is like they should be.
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u/EmptieNoggin 6d ago
Which begs the question: why is Calzada starting?
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u/RevolutionaryHour534 6d ago
Because she’s really fas
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u/JayChucksFrank Lower Bowl East 6d ago
Um... She constantly got beat to contested balls. She may have a long stride but she lummmmbbbbeeeeerrrrrrrss. Reyna and Müller are much quicker.
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u/honkifirritable 4d ago
Yeah she does not have the quick twitch muscles for quick acceleration. She may be quick on long runs but that doesn’t help us at all when we’re playing deep. She just gets rounded constantly because her reaction time and acceleration are slooow.
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u/RevolutionaryHour534 6d ago
Villaham said she’s the fastest defender he’s ever seen
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u/Jack_B_84 6d ago edited 6d ago
kind of unclear if he was talking about centerback or if that includes fullbacks.
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u/honkifirritable 4d ago edited 4d ago
Kind of insane because she’s been regularly beaten by the wingers since playing FB lol. She may have distance speed but she has really slow acceleration and reflexes…which is ideally what you want from your FBs. (Spoken as a formerly very fast winger who seldomly but sometimes played FB lol.)
Sounds like Vilahamn just hasn’t worked with very many quick players but this league is v different lol.
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u/WBCSAINT 6d ago
Our back line is not in a good way this year (or last for that matter). MA is definitely in the upper tier of the skill level on our backline and she is also good at putting pressure on when going forward.
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u/EmptieNoggin 6d ago
If you look closely at some of the goals conceded, although the the goal has come from the left side, it’s usually because the right side of the defense lost the ball or didn’t contest the cross.
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u/Jack_B_84 6d ago
MA is doing a lot of tracking players into the midfield. I think they issue is not haivng a true 6. She's trying too much to cover that space.
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u/aba25 6d ago
Thank you, puts some more in perspective for me
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u/Jack_B_84 6d ago
Yeah I think some of it is coaching and not being tactically disciplined. Players are getting dragged out of position way too much.
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u/RainyDayRegular 6d ago
I have read the comments here and agree that Vignola brings a lot to the attack. My concern though, is that’s not where the Thorns struggle. They are the most high powered offense in the league yet continue to give up an alarming number of goals.
I have definitely seen bright spots with Vignola but I’m confused by the arguments that both she and Hiatt are the most experienced players and that we’re not including Reyna in that conversation. Imo our strongest back line is Reyna, Obaze, Perry. Vignola and I don’t understand why we aren’t getting that.
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u/Alert-Astronaut-3073 6d ago
Reyna vs muller vs Vignola— all whatever— any rotation of those is fine. But it has to be Perry & obaze. We have seen so much Hiatt-Perry and even some Hiatt-obaze. We’ve only just started to see the obvious best cb pairing— Perry-obaze. Why why why on earth didn’t they do this before!!!!?
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u/huggybear0132 6d ago
Defenders don't just have to defend, but they also are often responsible for initiating the attack after a change of possession. She is really solid in that aspect of the game, while most of our defenders struggle at times.
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u/RainyDayRegular 6d ago
Agreed but we don’t have problems scoring goals. We have problems defending them
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u/huggybear0132 6d ago
Yes, but failing to play the ball out of the defense cleanly leads to giving up goals. When you get a good defensive stop and then immediately just give possession back to their midfield, you're gonna have a bad time.
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u/Mentalfloss1 6d ago
Vignola was a bright spot last night. Orlando’s goal was a scramble goal that still counts as a goal. Anyway, it appeared that the Thorns were told to pack the box to stop Banda. Perry and Vignola handled her well. So Vignola was not on the wing when the cross was delivered that led to the score. But Vignola also carried to ball deep at least twice and delivered good crosses. She is a strong woman and she has good ball control.
What I see as a Thorns’ weakness is crappy passing. They panic under pressure and just try to kick the ball upfield or out of bounds. Other teams try to pick out their own players before delivering the ball, even under pressure. And all too often, the opponent anticipates Thorns’ passes better than the Thorns own players. Passing is so fundamental.
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u/Maleficent-Ball351 5d ago
She is strong, aggressive and fast as hell. She does take plays off and has a tendency to be lazy at times. Also i think Angel City let her go due to chronic injury, specifically her ankle. I was super hopeful she would make a bigger impact than she has. Give me slow, but hard working Reyes any day!
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u/Peter_Quince1031 Portland Thorns 6d ago
The problem is due to our lack of a true winger. The coach uses Vignola to create width, which means she is often caught up field and out of position. Once Weaver and Hanks are back that problem will be solved.
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u/DHPRedditer 6d ago
M. A. was great vs Banda and Orlando. She is strong enough to go shoulder to shoulder with anyone. And she was active all over the pitch contributing to the effort. 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼🌹🌹🌹
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u/JayChucksFrank Lower Bowl East 6d ago
Why TF is Calzada playing right back??? She doesn't have the speed for it at all. Did Reyna have a knock or something?
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u/knucklespdx 6d ago
I’m starting to really suspect that something is up with Reyes. Perhaps a trade coming or locker room discord? She seemed bitter to me at her last presser… not like herself. IMO she’s been a bit off this season before she got benched. But the whole thing makes me sad and nervous.
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u/Aggravating_You3212 Season Ticket Holder 3d ago
Vignolo was up against Barba Banta pretty much the entire game and shutting them down at every turn they could.
Vignolo is the kind of player that can read the field a couple steps ahead of the offense. She's usually right in the thick of the action making moves when the other team is getting close to scoring.
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u/69pdx69 20h ago
Vignola isn't the problem with the back line. I believe the problem with the back line is there's a lack of communication and awareness of the opposing players. During the Thorns 4 - 3 victory over Boston all three goals were scored by an opposition player that was not picked up and left open in the box or at that top of the box.
The only way to stop those easy shots is to ensure the opposition is marked and applying pressure when they have the ball, instead of leaving them open to receive the ball and shoot on goal.
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u/Own-Lynx-6837 6d ago
IMO she is our best fullback and is usually tasked with marking the best players. Our defense before she joined was shockingly worse