The Crew have lost six of their last seven games. This leaves them in a very unfamiliar position, well behind in the playoff race.
Columbus is currently ten points behind the Houston Dynamo and the last playoff spot. The last time a Crew team was this far out of playoff position was in 2006 when they finished with 33 points and the worst record in the league, missing the playoffs by six points.
With the playoff chase nearly dead, the Crew are left asking a lot of questions and having precious few answers. They’ll get a chance to answer some of them as they hope to claw back into the playoff picture.
The biggest question starts with the offense and what happened to it? The Crew are 15th in goals in the league after finishing 10th last year. That’s a sizable drop off. The coaching staff had big expectations with a full year of Federico Higuain and Jairo Arrieta leading the way. They also added Dominic Oduro to give the team another dimension.
Higuain has been stymied and has a subdued five goals and six assists on the year. Beyond the basics on the stat sheet, the Argentine does lead MLS in OPTA’s key passes stat. Higuain has 88 passes that lead directly to a shot. So he is creating.
There is one area he’s struggled with. Entrusted with set piece duty, Higuain hasn’t scored off a free kick and has only has four assists off of set pieces. For a team with a decided size advantage, the Crew have been pedestrian.
Beyond Higuain, his supporting cast has let him down. Jairo Arrieta has struggled mightily and has only tallied twice. After scoring nine in a half season in 2012, the Crew expected big things from Arrieta.
There is one key difference between the Arrieta of 2012 and the 2013 version and it’s accuracy. Arrieta came into MLS firing. He was fourth on the team with 41 shots, but second in shots on goal with 21. He hit the target over 50% of the time, an impressive stat that only Italian veteran Marco Di Vaio can match this year. In 2013, Arrieta is still firing, but is only hitting the target 38% of the time.
Dominic Oduro is the lone bright spot with nine goals. His blistering pace has earned him numerous one on one chances and he’s taken advantage of them. The Crew have come to rely on him;36% of the team’s goals come from the Ghanian. Only the Vancouver Whitecaps rely on a single player more. Camilo Sanvezzo has scored 38% of the Caps goals.
The downside to leaning so heavily on Oduro is that the Crew offense dries up when he isn’t scoring. He has two goals during the Crew’s recent poor 1-6-0 run. The opposition can often focus on neutralizing him without fear of someone else stepping up. It’s worked.
While the solutions around how to fix the offense remain elusive, the Crew may have found the answer to who plays defensive midfield for the foreseeable future.
Gahanna native Wil Trapp signed a homegrown contract during the offseason and then proceeded to join the U.S. Under-20 team during the qualifying and the U-20 World Cup. Now that his commitments to the national team are through, he’s found himself in the lineup.
Trapp has started four games in his brief MLS career, debuting against the Portland Timbers on July 7th. He’s even displaced veteran options like Matias Sanchez and Agustin Viana.
Defensive midfield is a notoriously hard position to master. It requires players to be able to read the game well to make sure they are in the right position to make a play on defense or move the ball on offense. This usually requires years of playing time to develop a comfort level. Trapp has looked very good despite being a rookie at 20 years old.
Defensively, Trapp has already made his mark in the middle of the field. Looking to the league’s partnership with Opta, Trapp leads the team with 3.3 tackles a game. That is a better rate than veterans Viana, Sanchez, and Danny O’Rourke. He also has committed a single foul through four games. His tackling shows he’s involved. His lack of fouls is evident of successful positioning and technique.
In his limited time, Trapp has solidified himself as one an option on offense coming from midfield. He is the best passers on the team, leading the team in pass completion at 85%. He also has is fifth on the team in shots per game.
Columbus has 12 games left in 2013. There is still hope that they can get back in to playoff position, but the also have a chance to solve on of the biggest mysteries of the season. Where are the goals. At least there is one less question on defense.
