LA Galaxy and Real Salt Lake battle on a corner kick (Getty Images)
It may look like the plan on corner kicks and free kicks isn’t actually much of a plan at all, just more of a hit-and-hope gambit. You know, send the big center backs forward, tell them to mix it up and get on the end of something.
There’s also some truth to that.
On the other hand, most teams start out with some kind of base strategy. Hitting good balls into dangerous spots is the first prerequisite. Creating some traffic and distraction with cheeky picks (illegal, of course) may be part of the bid, too.
But there is almost always some kind of plan igniting the action.
Look how it worked for Los Angeles. The Galaxy like to get Edson Buddle in a tangle of bodies at the far post while Omar Gonzalez crashes the near post. Buddle, despite fairly tight marking from Nat Borchers, rose high to meet Landon Donovan’s outswinger and, voila, L.A. had an early lead. (Watch here.)
(Sidebar #1: Buddle’s opening goal also underscored the importance of not conceding easy corner kicks. Real Salt Lake fullback Tony Beltran needed to do more to attack the ball. Not making it more difficult drives managers crazy. But we’ll address defending corner kicks another day.)
The excitement of corner kicks—lots of big bodies colliding in a dangerous area—is matched only by their importance to the bottom line. Last year, 7.5% of all the goals scored in MLS came from corner kicks. So far this season, the effectiveness has climbed up to 9.3%. So if a team expects to contend, it needs to take advantage of those moments.
Recognizing how a team defends set pieces can be built into the offensive plan. Last weekend, San Jose did exactly that against New England, the rare side that defends zonally on corner kicks—a holdover tactic from coach Steve Nicol’s days at Liverpool.
New England are one of the best about challenging for every ball; Nicol stresses that there doesn’t always have to be a clean header away, but there must be solid challenge. But the Revs’ zonal marking creates an opportunity because defenders are somewhat locked into their zones. So Quakes coach Frank Yallop’s plan was to flood the back post with as many tall types as possible, creating a numerical advantage.
Which is why Ramiro Corrales, Ryan Johnson, Ike Opara and Chris Wondolowski all were found patrolling the far post as San Jose corner kicks or free kicks dropped in there. It paid off handsomely in the second half as Opara won the battle for Bobby Convey’s in-swinger for his second goal this year. (Watch here.)
(Sidebar #2: Opara struck similarly last week. Going forward he will find it increasingly difficult as defenses begin assigning their biggest body to mark San Jose’s 6-2 rookie. His ability to be dangerous on set pieces won’t be a surprise anymore. If it is, then someone’s not paying attention.)
Getting those balls to the back post may not always mean looking for something directly on target. On a couple of instances, Brandon McDonald or someone else made a late run to the front post, looking for something headed back across goal.
In this case, floating balls worked ok. Typically, though, balls driven across the face of goal are more problematic for defenders and, especially, goalkeepers. The men with the gloves have less time to calculate angles, odds and the risk of stepping off the line. New England’s recently acquired Serbian forward Marko Perovic, for instance, hits a dandy of a corner, one that falls around the top of the six-yard box. Knowing a ball will be driven also gives attackers the confidence to make hard, determined runs, as Revolution players do.
Often the target is one man rather than a gaggle of attackers. So it is for Kansas City, who generally aimed for Kei Kamara at the back post (especially after Jimmy Conrad subbed off with an injury) in their 1-0 loss to Seattle on Saturday. Kamara is a beast, about 6-3 and 190 pounds of muscle, and a handful for any defense that tries to mark him man-to-man.
But the targets don’t always have to look like chiseled behemoths. D.C. United, for instance, aim a lot of balls at Julius James, who is about three inches shorter than Kamara. But he’s highly athletic and has tremendous jumping ability. He got to a couple of good balls delivered by Santino Quartanta at the near post. Both missed narrowly—a common refrain for D.C. so far this year.
Sometimes, the actual corner kick does not deliver the deathblow. It comes in the follow up. The aftermath of a corner is often chaotic as the defending team attempts to reorganize and transition into a counterattack, and the attacking side works to maintain the pressure, especially if the clearance is poor.
Just ask Red Bull. In the 10th minute of Saturday’s match with FC Dallas, the New York defense poked away Heath Pearce’s corner kick, but then switched off their brains. The clearance found its way back out to Pearce, who whipped in another cross to the far post. The centering pass was unchallenged, as was Dax McCarty’s run into the penalty area, and the result was an early Dallas lead. (Watch here.)
The statisticians might not mark McCarty’s goal as a corner kick goal, but any coach who has done his homework and trained his team properly knows otherwise.
Galaxy look to keep shutdown magic doingPrimera Liga round-up
