End-of-year awards stuff kills me, because I almost never agree with the choices. And nothing, nothing gets me heated like Best XIs that would have no chance at performing well as a unit on the actual field.
Here's the big issue: formation matters in soccer. Clint Dempsey and Obafemi Martins may be the best forward combo in MLS, but they don't attack better when you simply throw on another forward to "help" them. Ours is a game of time and space, and the way to create it is to have guys working from different axes on the field.
Runners coming into the play early or late guys who can control the ball in midfield or swing it wide on the overlap. Defenders who can distribute early and with accuracy to get the whole thing started in the first place.
Soccer is a team game, and Best XIs almost never recognize that. Instead the nods always go to the guys who put the ball in the net, and give short shrift to the ones who helped create the structure to make that possible in the first place.
We love that structure. If we didn't, we'd all be watching lacrosse instead.
With that in mind, here's my personal Best XI - a team that both honors the guys who were the best at their respective positions and can function on the field - for 2014:
First XI
GK: Nick Rimando
RB: DeAndre Yedlin
CB: Chad Marshall, Bobby Boswell
LB: Waylon Francis
DM: Kyle Beckerman
RM: Fabian Castillo
AM: Lee Nguyen
LM: Landon Donovan
FWD: Robbie Keane, Obafemi Martins
And because I simply cannot stop, here's some more:
Second XI
GK: Bill Hamid
RB: Sean Franklin
CB: Nat Borchers, Matt Hedges
LB: Chris Tierney
DM: Osvaldo Alonso
RM: Ethan Finlay
AM: Diego Valeri
LM: Thierry Henry
FWD: Dom Dwyer, Bradley Wright-Phillips
Third XI
GK: David Ousted
RB: Andrew Farrell
CD: Jamison Olave, A.J. DeLaGarza
LB: Seth Sinovic
DM: Wil Trapp
CM: Marcelo Sarvas
AM: Javier Morales
RW: Sebastien Le Toux
LW: Clint Dempsey
FWD: Cubo Torres
A couple of quick notes:
- I actually think the third team has the best run-of-play balance with Sarvas and Trapp in central midfield
- Rimando gets the nod over Hamid because he pushes his own backline higher
- Kendall Waston & Jermaine Jones would both be first-teamers if they'd played the entire season
- The hardest cuts at each level were Joao Plata & Fabian Espindola (FWD), Lamar Neagle & Lloyd Sam (wing) Pedro Morales, Benny Feilhaber & Michael Bradley (CM), Perry Kitchen & Matias Laba (DM), Michael Parkhurst (CD), Steven Beitashour (RB) & Taylor Kemp (LB), and Luis Robles (GK)
- Winning matters. Only three players of my Best XXXIII didn't make the playoffs
Anyway, I've now had my say. Go ahead and have yours in the comments section below, and I'll try to pop in and answer a few questions over the course of the day.
