Oscar Pareja Shows Tactical Improvement Against Portland

In my eye, the biggest issue that our new gaffer has had has been his tactics. We expect tactical naivety from a first year manager, but it's been absolutely painful at times to see some of the decisions he has made. Very often he has outsmarted himself while trying to outsmart other coaching veterans of the league. I could count on my hand the number of times his needless tactical fiddling has worked, and I probably wouldn't need to use any fingers.

Oscar had a short layover between games against the Timbers, so all of the 1-0 loss at JELD-WEN was still fresh in his mind, I assume. There were a few key problems that plagued the Rapids in that game:

Oscar Pareja clearly assessed those problems and made adjustments to fix all three.

What happened? Those adjustments led to a 3-0 win for the Rapids.

Akpan and Cascio showed a chemistry up top together that we had never seen in several games of Cascio playing with Casey. Kosuke had one of the worst games of his career, matched up against Cascio like that. Zizzo became a non-factor with Zapata on his flank. Three moves, all with minimal risk, three successful tactical ideas to add to his resume.

That's what a great manager does — sees the weaknesses of the teams he plays and changes his team not to try and outsmart them with something they've never seen before (playing a high line against San Jose) but by changing the team specifically to match whatever they may be lacking in. The trick to turning Pareja into a great manager will be his ability to keep those sorts of things in mind in future games.

Until then, I would argue that the 3-0 win against Portland was the best game tactically he has had so far in his short managerial career.

Of course, there's not just a grain of salt to take the victory with, but a whole shaker of it. In most situations, Pareja won't get to face a team twice in a row and get the chance to so quickly make his adjustments. The Akpan insertion was a risk, despite it working out well in the end, and the game also took place at DSGP, where he has typically not made his most egregious tactical decisions. (4-1-4-1 formation in Seattle, anyone?) It will be interesting to see what he does against the Galaxy in Los Angeles.

It's good to know that Pareja is learning how to manage this soccer team well as he nears the end of his first season. It's a good sign, even if that learning curve is taking a full season to start gelling in.