FC Dallas: Postseason Preview
/By Kevin Minkus (@kevinminkus)
2019 Review
FC Dallas were expected by many to miss the playoffs in 2019. Following a disappointing early playoff exit in 2018 Dallas came into the season with a new coach and one of the youngest teams in the league. That mostly suggested it should have been a rebuilding year. It wasn’t, though. Luchi Gonzalez got the team playing attractive-ish, solid soccer right out of the gate. They lost just two of their first nine games. The season after that was a little more uneven, but on the whole Gonzalez managed to develop the team’s youth while implementing a fun, possession-oriented, high-pressing style of soccer that has, aside from in front of goal, been pretty effective.
Stats
FC Dallas’s defense, from their high pressing system, is mostly what has buoyed the team in 2019. Their defense was 6th best by xGA, and 7th best by 538’s SPI. It actually probably spiked during the middle of the season:
Games 15 to 20 or so were their stingiest stretch of the season - a run that included wins against Seattle and Toronto and ties to San Jose and Vancouver. A defense that good, over the course of a whole season, is enough to take a team to MLS Cup.
Their offense, though, has struggled. Dallas has the 10th ranked offense in the playoffs, according to 538. They are also the only team in this year’s playoffs to also lack a double digit scorer in both goals and expected goals.
Part of the narrative around this is that Luchi Gonzalez focused on coaching the team’s defense and build-up play, and that developing the system close to goal is something that takes more time. There is some evidence that speaks to this. Dallas’s xG generated improved over time:
Over the back half of the season their offense looked well above average. Zdenek Ondrasek, though he struggled early, is currently on 0.77 xG + xA per 90. That’s pretty good!
Their possession numbers steadily ticked up as well (though they began the season high, too):
One more thing to note - FC Dallas are poor away from home. They have the 8th worst road offense in the league this season.
How they play
Here’s a passing network for how Dallas’s formation generally looks:
The personnel may look different, especially with the middle three, but the shape is typically the same. FC Dallas pass the ball a lot around the back, with Acosta often splitting the center backs. From there they look to move the ball into the wings, especially on the right with Reggie Cannon and Michael Barrios (who they’ll also occasionally look for directly with long balls out of the back). When the ball goes wide, FC Dallas try to hit quick combination plays to open up transition attacks running at goal.
On defense, Dallas press high with pressure in the middle when they lose the ball. They’re pretty vulnerable, however, to teams that bypass that pressure by playing the ball immediately wide, either on the ground or with long balls to find one on ones against the fullbacks.
Their first round match-up
The bad news for Dallas is that the Sounders don’t really want to play through the middle, regardless of the opposition. They play the second least down the middle of any team in MLS this season. That wide play doesn’t happen very quickly for Seattle though. They’re not great at working it to the flanks in transition to counter. Seattle’s possessions that end in shots take the 5th most passes in the league.
Here’s their passing network from the teams’ last meeting:
Leerdam got very high and very wide on the right, and Jones did the same on the left, but Arreaga and Kee-Hee more often looked for Delem and Svensson in the middle than Leerdam, Tolo, or Jones out wide. The game ended 0-0 with Seattle having 60% possession and only 14 shots. They’ll probably want to work the ball to those spots quicker to have a better chance in the playoffs.
Dallas actually play down the middle the 5th least of any team in the league, so this will be a game that mostly happens in the wide channels. Seattle, between Jordan Morris, Brad Smith, and Victor Rodriguez (if healthy), probably have more talent than FC Dallas. But if Seattle don’t commit to forcing one on ones in space on the flanks, that talent differential might not matter.
Why they’ll make the final
FC Dallas probably are not going to make the final. While they have fantastic, young players, they don’t have top-end talent, especially close to goal. They’re also set to play every playoff game on the road. If they do make the final, it will be because Zdenek Ondrasek continues to mine his rich vein of attacking form, and because their press hits the same stifling highs it was at in the middle of the season.
Why they won’t
Dallas are, more than most teams, fairly rigid tactically. They consistently play with possession out of the back, and they consistently press high out of the middle. Adhering to principles is not on the face of it a bad thing, but they’re only a little bit better than average playing that way. Going into games as an underdog, it probably makes more sense to try out some tweaks or some strategies that give them higher variance on their performance. Flexibility and the capacity to try something different in a tournament setting are often competitive advantages, and it feels like Dallas are leaving something on the table by not leaning into that the way most teams do in the playoffs.