Shadow Scholar Syndicate: FWM/CA/N 2019--Day Twenty-Three Recap

Your “Syndicate Hangover” is proudly presented by “Perrier”

Your friendly bookie remains more of a San Pellegrino man, but we’ll accord the hosts some respect for their second-rate club soda. Along with La Croix, it’s an acceptable option when the only other alternative happens to be Seltzer Water.

Day 23: Recap

Bookie’s Stats—

Spread: 38-55

Straight up: 53-26-14

No, it has not been a good day for your despondent (yet still friendly) bookie. Germans expect the semis. You all know this. On top of that we’ve got my ongoing problems with Swedish prognostications. It’s as if I goaded the non-existent God and he, despite not-existing, responded in kind. Oh well. The non-existent God has spoken. It’s Sweden’s day!

Bookie will go ahead and bring back the picture from last Summer’s obituary….

Ach du Scheiße. It always hurts, especially when die Nationalmannschaft plays with no heart.

S.S.S. Tactical Breakdown

Just a fucking (non-existent) godawful match from my Mädels. I wouldn’t mind elimination if it didn’t come in such a shitty fashion. Not the way to play with the semi-finals AND next Summer’s Olympics on the line. Few positives to report upon here.

Lineup—Deutschland—Match Five (Projected) (4-4-2) (6/26/2019)

Alexandra Popp Lea Schüller

Sara Däbritz Giulia Gwinn

Melanie Leupholz Lina Magull

Lena Gößling Svenja Huth

Marina Hegering Sara Doursoun

Almuth Schult

Lineup—Deutschland—Match Five (Actual) (4-1-3-2) (6/29/2019)

Alexandra Popp Lea Schüller

Linda Dallman Sara Däbritz Svenja Huth

Lina Magull

Carolin Simon Giulia Gwinn

Marina Hegering Sara Doursoun

Almuth Schult

Last night we discussed a tactical masterstroke from USWNT coach Jill Ellis and her staff. Tonight, it’s the German writer’s turn to cover a complete failure. To suggest that Martina Voss-Tecklenburg’s tactical plan was derailed by the injury to Carlin Simon in the 43^rdminute rests upon the false assumption that there was a plan in the first place.

The formation you see above crystallized around the twelfth minute. Prior to that the players were all over the map. Following Sofia Jakobsson’s equalizer in the 22^nd, everyone was running around helter skelter again in ridiculous looking 3-2-3-2s, 3-1-4-2s, and all manner of broken shapes. It’s very clear to me that the players weren’t given any instructions against an opponent not taken seriously. It was tacitly assumed that German creativity would carry the day. It did not.

We’ll begin with the actual lineup selection. The 4-4-2 used in the previous two matches had begun to yield positive results. Lina Magull and Melanie Leupholz gelled reasonably well when paired in midfield together. When they broke apart—Leupholz to join the defensive ranks and Magull to coordinate the attack from a six position—both of them appeared comfortable in their flexible second roles.

In the 3-4-3 used in the second half of the Nigeria match, Svenja Huth showed tremendous promise on the left. Anyone paying attention to the German team over the course of this tournament knew that Giulia Gwinn could play on the forward right flank and Sara Däbritz could function as a short-striker. Verena Schweers may have needed replacing at left back, but one did not anticipate a substantial amount of tinkering.

For some reason, Voss-Tecklenburg went with a very bloated second axis that featured Linda Dallman and a press fullback in Carolin Simon. She also kept Gwinn in strict defensive positioning. Däbritz, Huth, and Linda Dallman rotated heavily initially. Lea Schüller also proved impossible to place. It seemed no one knew where they wished to be. Order eventually emerged from the chaos, but it didn’t last very long.

Following the Swedish equalizer, Gwinn moved up, Huth switched to the left, both Dallman and Däbritz dropped back, and Magull advanced to form the above grudgingly referenced 3-2-3-2. Naturally, this left the Mädels vulnerable on the counter. Further shifts precluded any attempts to establish some sort of attacking rhythm. At times they sent five forward and had no one left in the midfield. Gwinn and Huth switched fields on a couple of occasions for no apparent reason.

The Germans were rarely able to even possess the ball. What touches they did get in were heavy and sloppy. All of the directional shifting rendered them prematurely tired and mentally taxed. One could tell by looking at the faces of players like Magull, Huth, and Popp heading into the break that this team did not feel confident about their play. Their expressions conveyed a sense of weary defeat with an entire half left to be played.

Leonnie Maier—a natural right back—took Carolin Simon’s place on the back line shortly before the half. In addition, Dzsenifer Maroszan replaced Dallman at the restart. This meant the entire arrangement needed a page-one rewrite. When they did display some sort of shape, it looked like a 4-4-2 led by Popp and Maroszan. Gwinn took over at left back while Huth assumed the left fullback position. For those two players, this constituted their at least their fourth positional change of the afternoon.

It came as no surprise that this produced absolutely nothing. No one wanted the ball. Very few put in robust challenges. We witnessed a forward impetus on perhaps thrice during the entire second half. Lena Oberdorf’s introduction in the 69^thhad nothing to do with tactics or ideas at all. Voss-Tecklenburg simply attempted to insert a new set-piece target. They did find her on two occasions, but weak finishing from the 17-year-old led to the afternoon concluding on the dourest of possible notes. Nothing worked. Fuck me..

All subs receive a grade. In a first for the Syndicate, so does the coach.

Grades—Deutschland (Match Five)

Sara Doorsoun	A
Almuth Schult	A
Lina Magull	A
Carolin Simon	B+
Alexandra Popp	B
Sara Däbritz	B
Giulia Gwinn	B-
Leonnie Maier	B-
Svenja Huth	C+
Lea Schüller	C
Dzsenifer Marozsan	C
Lena Oberdorf	C
Linda Dallman	D
Marina Hegering	F
Martina Voss-Tecklenburg	F

One half of the centerback partnership performed well. Sara Doorsoun kept hustling, made some great tackles, and showed plenty of range. Her counterpart Marina Hegering was just awful in every respect. She played with a torpid gait, failed to provide even basic coverage at the back and even missed what should have been easy finishes in offensive play. It was about as thoroughly shoddy performance as one is likely to see from any footballer.

Däbritz did produce that brilliant set-up for Magull’s sumptuous finish in the 16^th. Otherwise, both players were horrendous on the dribble. They could have been graded much lower. Gwinn and Huth also earn higher marks than some of their play merits by virtue of all the positional shifts they were forced to endure. Maroszan gets a “C” for her average play, but could earn an “F” for not rallying the girls after her introduction. The alternate captain had some leadership responsibilities that went unfulfilled today.

The real culprit here is obviously the manager. She failed to adequately prepare the Mädels for the game, got way too fanciful in selecting her lineup, made all the wrong moves when it came to the substitutions, and implemented way too many doltish tactical alterations that ultimately pushed the match out of the team’s grasp. I remain unsure if the new coach should be given more time or not ahead of the Euro 2021 qualifying campaign.

I remarked at the onset of this tournament that quarterfinal attainment would be considered an accomplishment for this team. Thus, in a certain sense, I must declare myself satisfied. Of course, Germans are never truly satisfied unless they make the semi-finals. That’s the German credo.

We ask for nothing less and really nothing more from our teams. Win or lose in the Semis, it doesn’t matter all that much. So long as the team supplies us with maximum matches to wave our flags about during the Summer tournaments, it’s perfectly fine if one of them is a third-place match.

Once Summer is over, we pack all the flags and national pride away. One shall not see them on cars or windows until the German Nationalmannschaft kick-off in the Euros next year. So it goes. That’s the promise we’ve made to the World after our crimes against humanity. We shall keep our end of the bargain.

Time to move on. Aufwiedersehn Deutsches Vaterland!

Hang out there as long as you need to, Liebchen. ; ( ; (

“Riffs of the Day”—Day Twenty-Three

Reader: Some very rough challenges from the Italian girls, and then they argue with the refs. It seems they’re very adamant about their right to be wrong.

Vicey: ….tell me about it….though that does apply to most women.

Reader: You got Blackstenius Bitchslapped.

Vicey: Keep it coming. Might as well.

Reader: How are we feeling about that Commerzbank commercial now?

Vicey: …..und KEINE EIER!

Reader: German football is dying, Vicey.

Vicey: Shriveling faster than Lothar Matthäus’s bank account after the monthly alimony debits. I wanted to work in a Fredi Bobic reference in here too but it just wouldn’t come together.

Reader: Don’t despair, Vicey. Soon enough Toni Kroos will stride onto the pitch and send in a last-second free-kick winner.

Vicey: Bwhahahahaha…that’s a DOUBLE ZING for 19-M! Serious props for taking us back to last Summer.

Reader: Shout something in German for me.

Vicey: Sure thing, 15-M. Of course you have to speak a little German to get the play on words here:

“Meine Damen sind…(FR)AUS!!”

Reader: Why are there so many German girls named Lina, Lena, Leonnie, or Lea?

Vicey: That seems a trenchant question on which to end today’s mailbag. Bookie’s had just about all he can stand for one day. Perhaps we’ll include a few more deserved riffs in tomorrow’s daily.

That’s a really interesting query, 33-M. I’ve had it rattling around in my brain all day since you first texted it to me this morning. For some reason there was explosion of these “L” names among German babies between twenty and thirty years ago. Lena is the most popular. Any time you’re out about town you’re likely to meet twelve of them. It shows no signs of abating either. Lena Meyer-Landrut’s victory in the 2011 Eurovision Song Contest probably spawned another glut.

Much like the German girls today, I have no answers. My best guess is that something is that anything derived from the Greek Goddess of Light “Helena” sounds a lot better for a girl than more old-fashioned guttural options like “Brünhilde”, “Ursula”, “Berbel”, “Gertrudis”, “Ingeborg”, “Kunigunde”, “Hildegarde”, and “Olga”.

That’s not to say that it’s exclusively new phenomenon. My deceased great Aunt Lina would be about 120 years old now. The non-existent God finally caught up with Leni Reifenstahl a few years back at what I believe was the age of 159.

DAY TWENTY-FOUR—PREVIEW

AFCON Lines set to drop immediately after this post. Here’s your first look.

Nigeria vs. Madagascar