Great teams develop an identity, a set of core beliefs and values that form characteristic mentality, expressed as a recognizable personality during games. A strong personality shares beliefs and values within the team, understands what means on the field, and imposes it on opponents.
Great coaches like Bruce Arena, Alex Ferguson, Jurgen Klop, Pep Guardiola, and more recently Xabi Alonso, build a culture that sustains team identity across seasons and roster changes. On rare occasions a club develops an identity that lasts for generations, like Real Madrid, Barcelona and Ajax. Premier League clubs like Manchester United, Chelsea, Leeds United, Liverpool and Newcastle United lost their identity as the formulae for success shifted from identity to money.
In the early years, the Galaxy established themselves at the pinnacle of Major League Soccer, regularly reaching the MLS Cup final before winning one in 2002. Opponents struggled to contain tough, talented and relentless Galaxy teams. They built a state of the art facility that with features the Dignity Health Sports park, training fields, gyms, physical therapy, sports medicine that rivaled clubs around the world. They introduced celebrity to MLS with the arrival of David Beckham, translating it into trophies under Bruce Arena.
Core beliefs and values cannot be easily defined, but they can be expressed. If winning matters it will reveal itself in one on one confrontations, suffering together and attacking together. If the team matters, players will work for each other, do together what will succeed and sacrifice personal preferences and goals for the sake of the team. In one short week a renewed Galaxy identity emerged in five games, the MLS Next Under 15 and 17 finals, and three dominating performances by the Galaxy first team.
Coach Greg Vanney emphasized the importance of preseason throughout the 2023 season, leading up to the 2024 season. Once again injuries to key players and late arrivals to the squad robbed him of a meaningful preseason. Though an infusion of talented wingers Gabriel Pec and Joseph Paintsil and the pure genius of Riqui Puig, the Galaxy managed to climb the Western Conference table, sitting in fourth place before the international break. Those two weeks offered Vanney the preseason he desperately wanted, with the additional advantage of half the season to study.
“What we learned over the first seventeen games is when we stick with our structure inside of our system, and we make things clear for each other, but unpredictable for the opposition, we are at our best. When we start functioning and an improvisational world where we’re too all over the place, that’s when we are at our most vulnerable.”
Clarity and predictability within a team develops through principles of play and familiarity with each other. Structure and systems help players anticipate what teammates will do before it happens. It begins with basic one on one defense. When teammates know when and how a defender will commit to pressure the ball, they can all adjust their positions and responsibilities in support.
Core beliefs and values come into play when players win the majority of these duels. Martin Caceres remembered how Real Salt Lake forward Christian Arango dominated the Galaxy in the air in their first meeting. It was Caceres’ commitment to neutralizing Arango that led to a clash of two titans that sent them both to the training room for stitches. Arango’s ferocious domination of aerial duels partly explains why Salt Lake topped the table. Caceres neutralized it, though not in the way he intended to do it.
The Galaxy U-15 team and particularly the U-17s displayed the same tenacious commitment to winning duels this week. The U-17 team demonstrated their dominance by controlling the final from start to finish to win back to back championships. Individual toughness characterizes players from Galaxy academy product Jalen Neal all the way down through the system.
For the first time this season the Galaxy maintained team shape from game to game. When coaches refer to suffering they mean defending against long periods of possession by the opponent. Earlier in the season the Galaxy sometimes maintained over sixty percent of the possession during games. During the three wins they averaged only forty-six percent. This signals a renewed emphasis on solid team defense without the ball, rather than the abandonment of possession.
The attention to team shape also meant managing transitions better. Notice how the Galaxy defenders retreat together, and how they limit the options for the shooter. Rather than running straight back, notice how they run back toward the middle. This classic approach transition management results in the desired team shape. The players can spread out from the middle if the on switched balls or the opponent shifting the ball through possession.
The winning goal against Real Salt Lake occurred after twenty-eight pass sequence of possession. Gabriel Pec sliced through two defenders and sent a dipping shot that MacMath could only touch on the way into the bottom right corner of the net. Vanney pointed out that until the goal fell into their old habits on offense.
“There were times throughout the game where I felt we rushed things a little bit, where we kind of played down one side. The goal we scored was actually off of a little bit of string of possession where they had to do the work defensively and we separated them. They the opportunity showed itself and we buried it. ”
Notice how the one touch passing and how ball traveled forward on left side before they swung it back to the right. Notice how Fagundez could have played Pec initially but chose to combine off of Jovelic instead. Pec continued his run and Jovelic’s precise pass set up the opportunity. Pec displayed his quality on the first touch and the finish. High tempo passing set up an explosive transition for the goal.
The Galaxy Academy U-15 team attempted to generate periods of possession, but Chicago won the duels and won the game as a result. But reaching the final and displaying the basics of possession shows that the the entire Galaxy organization teaches the same principles of play, perhaps for the first time in its history.
I should be noted that the Galaxy generated some exceptional chances in the RSL game despite rushing the attack. After almost fifty games without rest between Genk and Los Angeles, Greg Vanney shut down Joseph Paintsil for almost three weeks. He showed preseason like rustiness when MacMath stoned him on a break away in the fifty-first minute. Midfielder Mark Delgado missed the top left corner by inches during another Galaxy transition. The goal by Pec revealed the difference between a controlled attack and the heater skelter nature of the earlier opportunities.
The difference between controlling games earlier in the season and the performances this week can be boiled down to possession with intent. The Galaxy played more passes forward and through the lines this week than they did early in the season. They finished off spells of possession with an offensive action and returned to defensive shape quickly without necessarily trying to win the ball back immediately. That’s what Vanney meant by clarity. Galaxy clarity causes the opponent difficulty. The tempo and anticipation within the team creates unpredictability for the opponent.
The recent emergence of Gabriel Pec reveals another core cultural value. Greg Vanney described the process that expresses it. “Finding ways for him to get involved was one of the first things we were trying to do with him when he first got here. When he first got here he was kind of hanging out wide, waiting for the game to come to him. We’re working with him to maybe find more interior positions, maybe get him on the ball a little bit more.”
Vanney wants his players to fit into the Galaxy identity in ways that complement the emphasis on individual toughness, team defense, possession with intent, and explosive transition moments. To accomplish this with Pec they introduced him ways he can get more touches, especially while already in motion. He also talked about the process with Edwin Cerrillo.
“I thought in the first three or four games of the season he was really strong. His defensive reading, the speed at which he covers, interceptions and breaking up plays is important for us. He’s a guy that never complicates the game. He always wants the game moving pretty fast which also helps the team find a rhythm inside of the game.”
Players like Delgado, Fagundez, Yamane and Cerrillo naturally establish a tempo in the passing game. Passes don’t surprise teammates because they expect only one or two touches. These two contrasting types of players illustrate how flexibility within the principles of play and the system can magnify the strengths of different types of players.
Forward Dejan Jovelic, who played a precise one touch pass, and Pec who scored, along with the space attacking skills of Paintsil all fit nicely into the system. There remains only one question mark. How does Riqui Puig fit as Vanney builds on this emerging Galaxy identity?
“I think it’s pretty clear for everybody what we’re trying to do. No team wants to be overly dependent on one player so we’ve gotta make sure that the game continues to spread around. But his qualities are unmatched in many ways across our league, so I look forward to getting him back in because I think the group is in a nice rhythm.”
That word “reintegrated” means that Puig will need to fit into the identity of the team. Some of that depends upon Vanney and his staff to do what they have done with Paintsil and Pec, finding ways to maximize his extraordinary abilities within the principles of the system. Puig must adjust his game to fit the system, but the rest of the team must also stick to the system no matter what Puig does. This perhaps will be the biggest challenge.
When Piug wriggles through five players and dashes forward with the ball, it tempts the rest of the team to rush forward with him, abandoning their shape and ignoring core principles of play. Players like Aude, Brugman, Delgado and Fagundez must resist the temptation to improvise. Puig will still be able to wave his magic right wand if the players around him stick to the principles of play within the system.
Fagundez started the play that led to the Pec goal with a smart pass. Puig will be able to find a pass that Fagundez would never see. Learning the discipline to stick to the system and anticipate those magical moments will determine how good the team can be.
“He has the ability to take us to another level when he gets reintegrated back into the group. So I’m looking forward to him getting healthy. He’ll be ready by next week”
Vanney and Puig face a potentially career defining couple of months. The Galaxy coach clearly understands what how he wants to integrate Puig back into the solid the Galaxy identity and maximize Riqui’s unique abilities. The California Classico and El Traffico will test team discipline and identity to the limit. How much will Vanney alter the approach to suit Piug?
In every interview during the week, the Galaxy players reiterated Vanney’s message, team shape, tactical discipline, resolute defending, possession with a purpose. After three consecutive wins and two shutouts, they obviously want to continue doing what made them successful. It will be interesting to see how they respond to Puig as he returns.