Since the star of the match (3-2 in favor of Miami) was almost 40-year-old Luis Suarez (two goals) – who stopped playing serious football several seasons ago – Robert Lewandowski will also shine here. Although – let’s be honest – his team is very average.
When you watch an entire football match from start to finish, you must come to the conclusion that it is a different sport than our European football.
WATCH THE VIDEO: Robert is alone in Chicago. He told when Lewandowski will get together
What is immediately noticeable about MLS is the lack of tactical discipline. For a person accustomed to the Polish, highly tactful Ekstraklasa, the match between Inter Miami and Chicago Fire must have evoked associations with… street football.
That is, one in which there is a lot of looseness and freedom in constructing attacking actions, a lot of ball control, little responsibility for losses and constant technical and tactical errors. For example, someone forgot that they should guard this or that sector of the field, or “cover” a particular opponent, or simply forgot… to hit the ball.
Like Miami goalie Rocco Rios Novo. After receiving a pass from a teammate, the Argentine made a bad move, his leg flew into the air and the ball rolled into the goal. A classic of the genre from the “Football Eggs” series. This has nothing to do with serious football. But is the MLS league serious? I have my doubts.
During this stunt, the Miami goalkeeper found himself under pressure from striker Robert Lewandowski, but let’s not add to the propaganda of success. The Pole’s participation in this goal was impossible, because the home goalkeeper simply made a catastrophic mistake.
And how did “Lewi” fare?
He was in the starting lineup and played 62 minutes. He fought, ran, but had no clear opportunity to score a goal. Several times he spectacularly received the ball (the so-called “English”), tried to shoot, but was blocked. There were moments when he retreated to the center to help his teammates build the action, because, unfortunately, none of them understand football as well as “Lewi.” Unfortunately, this does not bode well for the future.
What Robert certainly likes is that the whole team worked for the Pole. The partners know very well who the star is in “Fire”, and they looked for their leader in most offensive situations. They tried to play with him even when his position was unclear. Robert’s footballing qualities are evident in the team. In the way he plays, how he passes, what vision he has of the game. The rest of the Fire Team is not at this level. The thresholds are too high.
Firemen coach Gregg Berhalter recently got a little quick and excited and said, “We’re bringing Robert to the Fire to win MLS with him,” he said.
It’s a bold statement, but it’s hard to tell what the Chicago coach is being sincere and what he’s telling the public. It’s also hard to take Robert’s constant praise at face value: what kind of player he is, how many goals he’s scored, what a great professional he is, etc.
The icing is pouring out of Gregg Berhalter’s mouth, and we in Europe will have to get used to the fact that American communication standards are completely different. There is much less caution and restraint in statements, much more window dressing and the use of trade language, like: “we bought a great football player, a world star! You have to come and see it with your own eyes.”
We know “Lewi” and we don’t need to market him as “the woman with the beard.” We know what Robert can afford, and we know what he can no longer afford. I may be wrong, but I have the impression that the Americans are definitely promising too much at Chicago Fire after the Pole’s transfer.
I understand they want him to be a fan magnet. So that Robert would “fill” the stands, “sell” season tickets and, of course, score goals, win matches, win trophies.
To be honest, the Americans act as if they bought Lewandowski at the peak of his career, in his “prime time”. And what’s more, they think that no one will notice that this is not so. Maybe in America, because people there were not forced to do such things, but in Europe we know how it happens.
Do you expect Lewandowski to become the new Messi in MLS? Personally, I allow myself to doubt. We in Poland look differently at the sports context of the national team captain moving abroad. We rather believe that Robert went there for the sake of early retirement from sports in order to receive – for hard money – vouchers for a brilliant career in Borussia Dortmund, Bayern Munich and Barcelona.
We don’t have as high expectations as Americans, we know these are not Mr. Robert’s days. And I’m not writing this out of malice, I’m just really looking at his age and capabilities.
We remember Robert’s last season at Barcelona. There was no madness. Levi scored fewer goals, played fewer matches and played fewer minutes. He was more often injured or started the match on the bench.
On the Chicago Fire, he should be the first choice player, the star, the killer in the box. Putting extra pressure on Lewandowski now seems a bit inappropriate to me. Yes, I know and remember that Robert is a painfully ambitious person and would like to shine even in the peripheral MLS. The level of the American League – according to many experts – is lower than our Ekstraklasa, so it is possible that Lewandowski will score some goals in this America.
But it’s one thing to make it clear from the outset that anything above average from a 38-year-old footballer will be great, but it’s another thing to expect Robert to conquer the league in terms of sport, equip the club with trophies and conquer America in terms of marketing. This is unjustified optimism, and perhaps even naivety.
Maybe these fears will not be confirmed and everything will go smoothly for the Pole? After all, before moving to Barcelona, there were also concerns about whether Robert would cope in Primera and whether he was too old. And he entered this league with a bang, he was a giant there. Yes, he is now 4 years older, but the requirements in MLS are much lower than in La Liga.
We are already accustomed to the fact that – from whom and from whom – we can demand something from Lewandowski. And he usually “delivered.” But even today – at the beginning of this American adventure – you must realize that as a leader and a star, if you fail, you will be the first to suffer the consequences. And the balloon of expectations has already greatly inflated.
It is known that football is a team game and success will come to Robert only when the entire Fire team is in good shape, and not just Lewis. Meanwhile, it is worth realizing that the Chicago team has been showing average results in MLS in recent seasons. And there are no signs that the situation will improve.
The departure of league leading scorer Hugo Kuypers is certainly a weakening factor for the Firemen. The Belgian is the current top scorer in the MLS with 13 goals in 11 games, and it initially looked like he and Lewandowski would form a lethal striker pairing. However, after the Pole joined Fire, Kuypers became too crowded in the team. He decided to move to the Mexican Monterrey.
So do coach Gregg Berhalter’s Firemen have the potential to seriously consider winning MLS? There seems to be more fanfare here than a sober assessment of the possibilities. Moreover, we know little – even after his debut in the match against Inter Miami – about Robert’s athletic skills. It is logical that it cannot be very high.
Everything has already been written about the fact that Robert’s performance at Fire and his first days at the new club were far from perfect in terms of marketing and organization. But the sporting aspect itself was mentioned less. As if it is so normal that a football player starts playing in the league almost immediately after returning from vacation. He was just lying in the pool with his family, and now – please! – it’s already playing.
Lewandowski joined his new team just ten days ago. This is likely his shortest preseason of his senior career. Never before had he started playing for points so quickly after a vacation!
However, he was scheduled to play almost a week ago, against Vancouver Whitecaps last Thursday. “However, the meeting was canceled due to poor air quality in Chicago after winds carried huge clouds of smoke from wildfires in Canada.
Even if “Lewi” had only appeared symbolically in that match (a dozen or two minutes), this would have meant that he would have run onto the field after at least two training sessions with the team! This will never happen in any European league. Even if we take into account that Robert behaves very professionally and that before coming to the United States he took part in one or two individual training sessions at the Legia center, these are still classes that made the cat cry.
This could not happen in any major league. Now, after several training sessions, he played more than an hour in the points match.
So is MLS a serious competitor? Let’s be honest: this is a product for connoisseurs. This product requires an amateur. But if there are foodies who choose pineapple pizza, there might also be those who will stay up all night to watch “Lewi” perform at Chicago Fire. Who knows?