Sacramento vs. Las Vegas: Tactical Analysis
05/17: Sacramento’s line up, the good, the bad, and what stood out
The Lineup:
Well that was nice to see! Republic’s 5-0 drubbing of Las Vegas Lights is Sacramento’s largest victory since beating Louisville 5-0 way back in April of 2023. It is important to ask though: was this a one-off performance? Or a sign of things to come? Let’s take a look.
Looking at the starting XI first, Collins made a few minor tweaks to his 3-4-3 lineup from the past few matches. First, Lewis Jamieson steps in at the left wing to replace an injured Russell Cicerone—in the previous match, it had been Wanner stepping into that role. Collins’ then made interesting adjustments to the midfield with Nick Ross starting in the center of the pitch with Blake Willey. This left Luis Felipe and Rodrigo López on the bench, though both would eventually sub into the match.
Sacramento additionally appears to have locked in their starting defensive structure—this is the third straight match where the three centerbacks were Lee Desmond, Freddy Kleemann, and Jared Timmer, with Jack Gurr and Michel Benítez playing right and left wingback respectively. The result? A total of one goal against in those three matches, with Republic taking a total of seven of nine points.
Likewise, the attacking side of things is beginning to take shape. With the exception of the left wing, which has been rotated due to Cicerone’s injury, Sebastián Herrera and Cristian Parano have started up top together the last four league matches, with the duo averaging a player rating of 7.2 over that time. Republic has scored nine goals in those four games.
The only part of the field that appears to still be on an active rotation is the midfield. In the past five matches, Republic has fielded four different midfield duos, consisting of some combination of Roro, Felipe, Willey, Ross, and Benítez. With Benítez now a lock in the left wing-back role, it will be interesting to see if the club continues to rotate the midfield combination, especially with Ross now back from injury. Collins’ has four strong choices to start and sub on a weekly basis, and he has not been afraid to make changes mid-match when he’s deemed it necessary—in both this match and the match against Indy Eleven, he made a midfield sub at half. Part of this rotation is almost certainly to help manage minutes, but I do wonder if another part of it is Collins’ waiting for a particular midfield duo to show that they deserve to regularly start.
The Good:
It happened, it finally happened! For the first time this season, Republic shot 50% or more of their shots on target. And look at the results: five goals. What really sells this is that Republic’s nine total shots in this game is their fewest in a game all season. It’s also the first match this season where they have not registered a shot from outside of the box. I have pointed out several times this season that Republic have been far too trigger happy this year; at one point, they were second worst in the league in conversion rate while leading the league in total shots. Sacramento has slowly been dialing that down, and it paid off in a major way here. And a big congrats to Herrera for scoring career goal #100:
While breaking down every goal seems like overkill, three goals in particular stand out as being great examples of how Neill Collins and his 3-4-3 system are supposed to work. First, we have Gurr’s goal on the back post in the 36th minute:
We actually discussed this exact look in our quarter season review last week:
One of the benefits of this 3-4-3 system is that the wingbacks are able to get forward and test the width of the opposing defense, which in turn gives a wingback multiple options in the box when crossing—all three forwards, and the opposite side wingback. And that is exactly what happens. Republic switch the play from the right side to the left through the midfield, get the ball to Benítez on the wing, and the three attacking strikers confuse the defense, leaving Gurr with only a single man to beat on the back post. It is Republic’s first wingback to wingback goal of the season, and it is a look that this system encourages.
The second goal that caught my attention was Jamieson’s goal in the 44th minute:
The other key aspect of Collins’ 3-4-3 is the high-press look you see here which, when executed correctly, has allowed Republic to steal turnovers high up the pitch and can take the bite out of opposing team’s counter attacks before they develop. Despite having a two goal lead just before half, Sacramento is still pressing high in Las Vegas’s own half—and it causes an immediate turnover. Jamieson does a fantastic job of getting wide of the center back and finishing it, but this goal is created by Ross when he puts a heavy press on the Lights player and forces the mistake.
Speaking of that press, one of the issues Sacramento has had with closing out prior games is giving up the press around the 75th minute to play more defensively—which has resulted in a slew of late game goals. Not tonight though, despite the 5-0 scoreline, where Sacramento can still be seen pressing up high as late as the 85th minute:
Roro reads this perfectly and comes in to double-team the Vegas player, which lets him easily scoop up the loose ball. Trevor Amann makes an excellent run across the box to get in position, and puts an excellent heading finish off a perfect cross. But similarly to Jamieson’s goal, this goal is created during the press, where this time Jamieson himself implements the press despite already putting in 85 minutes on the pitch.
We also need to give a highlight to the man between the sticks, Danny Vitiello. The unfortunate truth of goalkeeping is that fantastic saves are usually a result of poor defense elsewhere, so Vitiello’s highlights often end up in the “Bad” section of these articles as part of a negative aspect of Republic’s defense. We will talk more about this play a little later on, but just focusing on Vitiello’s part of this, this is a fantastic double save:
He reads the free header and is able to make a diving first save to his left, and then quickly gets up to protects his near post on the follow up shot. Danny had four saves in this match and two claimed crosses to earn Republic’s second clean sheet of the season.
The Bad:
I am not quite sure what to look at in this section this week. There’s not a lot you can say negatively when you win by five and get a clean sheet. You could maybe argue that Willey played a bit poorly from a start in midfield, hence the halftime substitution of Felipe, but Willey has a 6.7 player rating—not above average like the rest of the squad on the night, but still about on par with a standard performance for a USL-C player.
If you want to nitpick, you could also argue that the defense needs to tighten up just a bit; the clean sheet is fantastic, but Las Vegas had a few dangerous chances that required Vitiello to come up with some big saves. I do not think these chances change the outcome of the game, but they are things that need to be better on the days where Republic’s finishing isn’t what it was tonight. For example, the aforementioned play just after the start of the second half that requires Vitiello to make a big double save:
It’s two great saves by Danny, but the midfield and backline should not have allow this cross to come in at all from this position and the backline gets beat over the top for a free header. Las Vegas also hit the woodwork twice in this match. To not be a total downer, Sacramento does completely outperform the Lights and win this game even if one or two of these chances go in, but scoring five goals in a game to offset these situations is not realistically going to happen weekly.
What Stood Out:
A fantastic win, especially for a team that has been hurting for goals, while playing against a Vegas team that came into the game with the 3rd best defense in the entire Championship. There are a lot of takeaways here that point towards continued progress—a solidified backline that is growing more confident, the club shooting less but more accurately, and a tactical change in backing off the press late in the game. I don’t think anyone expects Republic to score five goals a match (if you do, I admire your confidence), but the pieces are there for the Quails to regularly score two goals a game and keep a clean sheet, especially when Cicerone returns from injury. Sacramento is only five points off the top of the West, where a New Mexico team that Sacramento has already beat sits, and Sacramento has a game or two in hand over three of the five teams ahead of them. There’s work to do, but a win of this magnitude is a great confidence boost going into a bye week.
Republic follow the bye week with a home USL Cup match on May 31st against this same Las Vegas team, before returning to USL league play at home on June 7th with a major showdown with the second in the West, FC Tulsa.