Colorado joins five other MLS squads in the Desert Diamond
Cup from Tucson, AZ this week with the hopes of putting the finishing touches
on their gameplan before starting the season at home March 4. Taking into account the Rapids are playing
two opponents they’ll see in the first month of the MLS season, is Head Coach
Pablo Mastroeni going to hold any tactics or personnel back for when it really
counts? “At some point everyone’s going
to see the way you’re going to play anyway-we’re not trying to hide anything,”
says Coach Pablo. “If you try to hide
things from teams, more often than not, you end up surprising yourself.”
Mastroeni explains that he doesn’t want anything to come up
when matches count in the standings that hasn’t been addressed already in order
to feel comfortable reacting. “You want
to know exactly what’s being asked, and be able to execute that in these games
that are going to be MLS opponents. Then
make your adjustments, and go to the next one, and make your adjustments so
using each game as a barometer of where we are at and where we need to improve
on both sides of the ball and in transition.”
In addition to those adjustments, players such as Captain
Sam Cronin must also pay attention to getting the physical side ready as well
as the tactics. “The main focus so far,
obviously fitness is probably the top priority, just getting a better idea of
how we want to set up offensively and setup the kinds of movements and triggers
we have,” Cronin explained to the Voice of C38. “Our attacking play has been the main
focus. We’ll get into main competition
games, results, defending-all that but fitness and attacking style so far.”
The Desert Diamond Cup provides a great laboratory for
Colorado to work on these things against different types of defenders and
attackers in a concentrated environment.
Cronin adds, “It’s learning lessons and improving certain areas of play
and introducing new areas with the focus of being a complete team as we start
the season. I want to make sure that
we’re getting fitness but that we’re putting all these little lessons
together.”
Players are competitive, however, and Sam admits any time
you can win a competition and take home a piece of silverware you would like
to, saying, “Hopefully, we win games in Tucson-there’s a trophy to be won down
there-but with they eye on March 4th.”
The Rapids are in a good position compared to recent past in
that the turnover has been relatively small from last season’s historic
run. Cronin takes that in stride,
however, admitting it’s part of the territory but does help when there are more
familiar faces around camp rather than nametags. “Every team changes from year to year,
whether the season was good or bad, it’s just the nature of it. First priority for me is to do my job well
and from there, try to help guys around me.
If I’m not doing my job then I can’t say a word to anybody. I’ve got to focus on my position, my roles
and responsibilities, and go from there.”
“There’s more continuity for sure. Everyone’s on the same page, knows their job,
we’re all fit and healthy ready to go.
The large majority of last year’s team is back so the little nuances
that you just pick up on by playing, those relationships are already
built. We’re trying to improve primarily
the offensive end and get more goals and maintain our defensive form from the
last couple seasons.”
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