It may be a little difficult watching Montreal Impact at the moment, but it’s hard to fault the coach’s strategy. The team bears the hallmark of new management, and is clearly working to a rigid plan.
Remi Garde has evidently looked at the videos and stats from last season, and determined to prioritise by, quite rightly, fixing how his new team defends.
It means being disciplined when not in possession and dropping to halfway; they are almost saying to the opponent, “OK show us what you can do!”
For much of the first-half last night in St-Petersburg, a stranger to the game of soccer would have been hard-pressed to select which was the MLS team, but then on the stroke of half-time came the one piece of attacking quality that broke the deadlock, and gave away the answer.