Tending the Garden
Fixing the Portland Thorns
2025 was always going to be a challenge for the Portland Thorns. The Thorns were coming off a disappointing 2024 campaign, where they finished in 6th place and exited the playoffs in the first round. The offseason wouldn’t prove much kinder, as the Thorns would lose six key players. Two of the Thorns’ captains would retire, with World Cup winner Becky Sauerbrunn and club legend Christine Sinclair deciding to hang up their boots. Marie Müller, Nicole Payne, and Morgan Weaver would all be placed on the season-ending injury list. And last but not least, Sophia Wilson announced she would be missing the season due to maternity leave (Wilson will be a free agent at the end of the 2025 season). The Thorns have done a decent job navigating this challenge so far, with the club sitting in 4th place and on course to make the playoffs at the time of writing, but that doesn’t mean the club isn’t underperforming. Anyone who routinely watches the Thorns knows this team is capable of better, and to me, a lot of this has to do with manager Rob Gale’s suboptimal setup of the team.
The Problems
To understand how Gale wants his side to play, we’ll take his setup from one of the Thorns’ best performances this season, their 4-2 win in the Cascadia Clash against the Seattle Reign on August 10th, 2025. The Thorns look to create chances primarily in the wide midfield areas, progressing the ball to those areas with either short passing or more direct play. Once the ball is on the flank, the Thorns look to play in short, quick combinations in order to create the chance to play the ball behind the defensive line, where one of the front three can run onto the ball and attack the goal with momentum, often looking for crosses into the final third.
There are a couple of problems with this approach, the most prominent of which is that it is away from the strength of the team. The Thorns have an abundance of quality in midfield, and it is unquestionably the team’s strength. They are anchored by their captain, Sam Coffey, who, for my money, is the best defensive midfielder in women’s football. In front of her, the Thorns have their pick of Jessie Fleming, Hina Sugita, Mimi Alidou, and Olivia Moultrie. Meanwhile, the Thorns are incredibly thin in the attacking wide areas. On the left, the Thorns are missing Weaver, as mentioned earlier, and electric rookie Caiya Hanks would also go down for the season after picking up an injury on July 15th against the Spirit. On the right, the Thorns often needed Moultrie and Alidou to deputize, as they have gone the whole season with just one dedicated right winger on the team. Peyton Linnehan was on the roster (though often overlooked by Gale) for the first half of the season before leaving for the Courage, and the Thorns would look to replace her by bringing in Julie Dufour from Angel City. This makes the decision to focus on the wide areas an interesting one from Rob Gale. There is often more space afforded to teams out wide as defenses typically choose to block out the center, but it’s not always the smartest choice to try and attack those spaces if it’s a weakness of the squad. This focus on the wide areas can also very easily become one-dimensional, with the team not having alternative ways of progressing the ball up the pitch. This leaves the Thorns often struggling to break down a settled defense, resorting to low percentage attacks like long shots and crosses.
Without the ball, the Thorns tend to vary their approach, pressing high in some matches and sitting off in others. There is nothing inherently wrong with this flexibility; in fact, it has quite the upside, but the constant chopping and changing has led the Thorns’ defense to often be unorganized. Presses aren’t coordinated, and responsibilities are often lost when defending in a block.
The Fix
So how do we go about fixing the Thorns? If I were the manager, the solution for me would be a different tactical system. I’ve decided to set the thorns out in a 3-4-2-1, allowing the team to get the most out of the current roster.
One of the main strengths of this formation is the “box” midfield, enabling a team to put four midfielders in the center of the park. Due to the roster constraints that we discussed earlier, this helps the Thorns get more of their best talent on the pitch, while avoiding playing dedicated wingers. Having four players in the center means the team will outnumber most midfields, enabling easier play through the center of the pitch. The lack of wingers means the attacking width in this system comes from the wingbacks. Reyna Reyes and Mallie McKenzie both love to get forward, so this change wouldn’t be limited by a poor profile match at that position. This shape also allows the Thorns to tweak personnel (and their plan of attack) based on the opposition. For example, new signing Julie Dufour could play on the right of the attack in a more traditional role, allowing Kaitlyn Torpey to play more defensively on the same side. The Thorns could then send Reyes forward, with a dedicated number 10 like Olivia Moultrie tucking in from the left to form a 4-2-3-1 in possession. This flexibility allows the Thorns to attack opposition weaknesses and get the most out of their current roster.
Another benefit of this system is that it provides a ton of stability defensively in every third of the pitch. The even distances between the players mean the shape is great for pressing, helping the Thorns to get back to their DNA. This shape gives the team the option to press inside-out or outside-in, and the extra player in the center of the defense allows the rest of the team to be more aggressive in the press. In a block, the wingbacks can easily drop back to form a back five, with the advanced midfielders falling to the wide areas to form a 5-4-1 block that is incredibly difficult to break down. The last significant change I would make is bringing in Bella Bixby as the starting keeper. Bella had a great run of games when Arnold went down with an injury earlier this season. I understand Gale’s reluctance to move away from starting a club captain, but Arnold has underperformed and made plenty of mistakes since coming back into the team, and starting Bixby would no doubt help bring some more stability at the back for the Thorns.
The season is far from over for Portland. The club made some strong signings in the summer window, and the team is on track to make the playoffs, possibly even with home-field advantage in the first round. The Thorns need to have a convincing end to the season, both to recover to their standards and to have any chance of resigning their taliswoman, Sophia Wilson. It’s not outside the realm of possibility for it to happen, but these changes would go a long way towards helping see that finish through.
