Unirea Urziceni 1 VfB Stuttgart 1: Another disappointing result

By: Pete | October 1st, 2009

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Apologies not writing sooner; site upgrade difficulties. And trying to calm down from another lackluster performance. Deep breaths. Another CL opportunity squandered. Stuttgart could easily have come out of these first 2 matches with 6 points but instead sit in 2nd place with a measly 2 points and they now have to face Sevilla in the next 2 matches. Sevilla will surely be looking to seal their advancement to the next round in these next 2 matches; a nice incentive. This, of course, also gives Rangers back to back games with Unirea. Worst case scenario they come out with 6 points and we’re suddenly scrambling if Stuttgart can’t come out with at least one positive result against Sevilla. Stuttgart doesn’t inspire much confidence in this regard after what they’ve shown us thus far in this CL campaign.

I don’t want to dissect the game too much; thanks very much to everyone who posted in the rant box for this exact reason. I’ll be looking to continue to do that in the future and hopefully we can get more comments before, during, and of course after the match. Here’s just a couple of the glaring points I noticed as well as some of you mentioned out there as well.

-Blown chances: Each of these past two games Stuttgart could have easily scored 2 or 3 goals and put the game out of reach before there was even a chance of a tie.

-Lack of killer instinct: This ties into the last point but cannot be stressed enough. Stuttgart seem content to sit on their hands after scoring the first goal, and as was aptly pointed out, are not a particularly good team defending a one goal lead. They’ve time and again shown us that. Not only that, but if you’re going to go with this strategy, it’s in your best interest to try and control ball possession a bit more! Sloppy passing and a defensive mentality gifted Urziceni far more possession than one would’ve liked to see. Stay on the offensive, score the 2nd goal, and put the contest out of reach.

-Shoddy defense: Stuttgart clearly had the brunt of scoring chances, but one could argue that Unirea had plenty of their own VERY good opportunities to score a few themselves. There were a few chances on crosses and set pieces that the ball was not cleared out and with a better touch could have been easily been put in the back of the net. And of course on the equalizer, a terrible clearance that ultimately cost Stuttgart all 3 points. I like how Boka presses forward and he’s shown how dangerous he can be on crosses and even on long range efforts, but by and large we really need to shore up the back four.

I’ll reserve blame on Babbel for now, but as has been pointed out I am getting a bit concerned with squad selection and tactics overall. Also not to be overlooked, it’s his job to keep the team motivated and one can’t place the blame squarely on his shoulders for the complete lack of killer instinct and overall lack of toothless play, but he certainly is the headpiece of the squad and if a confidence and winning aura emanates from him it would surely breed a similar feeling down to the players as well. It’d be nice to see a bit more of that from the captain, too.

I leave you with the comments of Babbel and a video summary of the match. Big match this weekend, look for a preview in the next day or two.

“We dropped two points here tonight. We gave away the goal that we conceded far too easily and we were bitterly punished for our lapse. Unfortunately we failed to make use of a number of the chances we created. In the first half we were too passive and dropped back too deeply after we’d gone in front. I remarked upon that during the break and things did go better in the second half. The lads are really not used to playing every three days but we’re working on that. We still have everything in our own hands and that’s a good position to be in.”