How Maya McCutcheon is Redefining "Small Ball"
In Maya McCutcheon, Wellington Phoenix have sophistication personified. She's Jazz age, cocktails by candlelight, Paris in the rain. She's Small Ball 2.0.
One thing Paul Temple’s boffins and technocrats have consistently delivered on is their overseas recruitment. Presumably, forced to watch hundreds of hours of grainy football videos on little nutritious sustenance in a disused military bunker somewhere in Trentham, until they can show their masters footage of a diamond in a faraway land. Under Temple, these boffins have imported, to over generalise, young American players who are yet to secure regular first team football in the NWSL with heart and drive to build the solid foundations of a professional career. Of this delightful category to date, maybe the finest cut diamond among these is Maya McCutcheon.
Signing an experienced winner
McCutcheon, an athletic conductor at the base of midfield played all 23 matches for West Virginia University (WVU) during their successful 2022 season including the Big 12 Championship game in November of that year. McCutcheon ranked fourth in minutes played that season for WVU highlighting her importance as the team qualified as conference champions for the NCAA National Championships, the premier soccer tournament at college level. Temple has used McCutcheon for more minutes than any other player this season. Having missed out on selection via the draft, McCutcheon joined North Carolina Courage but did not make any appearances before joining Wellington Phoenix for the start of the 2024 season.
McCutcheon is one of those rare sorts that look comfortable anywhere on the pitch. Like Alssya Whinham, they see the game differently to most, play moves slower in their mind’s eye and their decision making is crisp and decisive. Temple has already played her at centre back and in her more suited midfield holding role where she’s scored once, with more to come if her stats from college follow into the professional setting. Statistically, McCutcheon performs highly relative to her expected role throughout matches. She leads the team in tackles and is second across the league, she’s second across the team in pass blocks and turnovers behind Lara Wall, and she is third across the team for live ball passes and touches behind only the centre halves. Such metrics only partly illustrate McCutcheon’s value added but they do confirm what the eye test suggests.
Competency and Heart
McCutcheon is an adept athlete who’s clearly the coaching staff’s preferred utility player trusted to do a job across the field. On her debut, it was McCutcheon entrusted to drop back into defence after the horror start against Western United on opening weekend to shore things up. They did, not conceding again in the match. However, it is in the holding midfield role where McCutcheon is best suited and utilised. She knits play together wonderfully, Only Annalie Longo has more successful passes by non-defenders highlighting how intentional and willing the team are to play through McCutcheon and anchor attacks in her possession.
In the loss to Melbourne City, Temple opted for a 4-2-3-1. McCutcheon had the added support of Daisy Brazendale in that holding midfield area supplementing defensive duties. Brazendale thrived as a disruptor-in-chief with McCutcheon taking on the progressive responsibilities of the midfield. This match was one of the best defensive performances of the season albeit with a loss. It was the team’s second lowest expected goals against (0.6) playing at the time, the league’s runaway leaders. Notably, it was also City’s second lowest expected goals of the season. Yet, it was the manner of this display that impressed most. City were at arm’s length for all but a brief 10-15 minute spell after City’s triple substitution on 55 minutes. The two goals were a fluke own goal and a momentary defensive collapse one minute later. The 4-2-3-1 shape suited both McCutcheon and the team for the task at hand and limited to just 32% possession. The shape applied an athletic defensive 6 with McCutcheon playing the advanced holding role who would push up in transition.
Against Adelaide, McCutcheon was instrumental offensively in a performance that exemplified her value added to the team. Winning the ball high up culminating with shots on goal, a gorgeous one touch out of the feet and shot from outside the box whistling narrowly wide and ending the half with a prod in from 5 yards out.
In the Melbourne Victory match, it was the change of shape moving McCutcheon into midfield after the hour mark that sparked the Phoenix’s developing foothold in the game, particularly further up the field. McCutcheon’s 15 metre diagonal pass out to Mebae Tanaka opened Melbourne up leading to a clear shot on goal. More emphatically, it’s McCutcheon who finds Emma Main wide right to provide the sumptuous assist for the equaliser. The beautiful cross was made possible by McCutcheon taking a pedestrian sideways pass beating one player and then incisively and with pace playing the ball wide for Main’s one touch, cross. McCutcheon’s sudden injection of pace here created the opportunity.
Import players often personify beyond their on-field accomplishments. There are so few of them that they become key touchpoints on a team’s development or style, the embodiment of something they have no control over but are convenient motifs of. In that, McCutcheon is a maturation and sophistication of Temple’s Small Ball. She glides across the pitch with an assured competency, she instructs, and by will of personality, she seems to be one of the vocal heartbeats of the team. Just quietly however, remember her stock, she’s also a winner.
Please note that statistics discussed here were from: https://fbref.com/en/squads/bc52ac89/Wellington-Phoenix-FC-Stats and are accurate up to Round 8 2024/25 season.