If you were seeing deja vu after watching Ethan Finlay's equalizer against New England last Saturday, you weren't alone.
Finlay's tally, his ninth of the season, was fairly similar to his goal against Montreal the weekend prior in the sense that Finlay's first touch and speed were the final elements in the strike. What was dissimilar was the amount of space the Crew had with which to work. Against the Impact, Montreal's imbalance led to wide open areas for the Crew to move the ball up the field. Against New England, the Black & Gold had to muscle their way out of tight spaces in order to create the goal, fueled by Tony Tchani in the midfield and Finlay to get around Jose Goncalves.
Let's take a look at the goal in this week's edition of the Film Room.
The play started with Bobby Shuttleworth playing a long ball out toward the center of the pitch. Tyson Wahl chests it down to his right to maintain possession. Look how close Charlie Davies gets to cutting this play out by extending his left leg toward the ball. The difference between making a play happen and not can often be a matter of inches; here, Davies proves that. If the Revs striker gets a touch on this ball, it's possible the goal doesn't happen at all.
From here, Wahl runs the ball toward the center circle, where Tony Tchani drops down to collect it. He evades a tackle from Jermaine Jones...
...and looks up-field to survey the scene:
The first thing to notice here is the amount of options that Tchani has. None are particually more obvious than the other. From top to bottom, Tchani has Eric Gehrig making a wide run, Ethan Finlay looking like he might have an angle to split the defense, Justin Meram coming back toward the ball, and a stationary Federico Higuain out wide to the left. He also has Aaron Schoenfeld available if he wanted to try an over-the-top ball, but that seems unlikely given the other options here.
Tchani also has the presence of defenders immediately on him to deal with: Scott Caldwell to his left and Lee Nguyen to his right. About to close down on him, Tchani has his head up here and knows he has to make a quick decision.
Tchani keeps dribbling up and to his right and decides to play the pass to Finlay. Notice the difference between this goal and Ethan's goal against Montreal: Finlay has his back to goal when this pass is hit and it doesn't necessarily look like he has a completely advantageous position on the defender. In fact, although a clear passing lane exists, two Revolution players are in the area. Tchani, however, hits the pass absolutely on the nose, in the perfect area for Finlay's technique to take over.
Finlay does a great job of turning his body as the ball is coming in, showing good spatial awareness. As it arrives, he takes it on his right foot after rotating his hips nearly 180 degrees. No screenshot can really do this particular part of the play justice, because the speed with which Finlay takes his first touch and blows by Goncalves is impressive. Take a watch in the video above to fully grasp the ability Finlay shows here.
We often think of Ethan Finlay as a speed player, but he shows impressive physicality as well to fend off the bigger Goncalves (five inches taller, 15 pounds heavier) after using his quickness to get around him. Once he has a step, he is able to muscle ahead and create a one-on-one situation, and the finish is (relatively) simple from there.
Breaking this goal reveal down reveals the razor-thin margin for error the Crew overcame in order to bag the equalizer. Two tackles were narrowly missed, Tchani's ball had to be perfect, and Finlay's touch and speed were on-point in giving the Crew a 1-1 tie with the Revs at the time.
