WASHINGTON, DC (May 4, 2008) USSoccerPlayers -- Chicago was the only club to rise above the ten point jam behind Columbus, easily beating New England while the Crew continue to be the class of Major League Soccer.
Kansas City 1 - Columbus 2
If anybody doubted Sigi Schmid's successful rebuild, it might be time to pretend that was never an opinion. The Crew got the benefit of the latest rendition of the now standard MLS plot device: score early and then get an extended period of 11 v 10. This time around, it was Adam Moffett opening in the 4th, Robbie Rogers getting the second in the 34th, and Kansas City losing Roger Espinoza in the 36th.
"I think that there were a couple of times when our back line was stepping when they should be dropping," said Wizards coach Curt Onalfo. "We have a lot of young players on our team, so we are going to make those mistakes. We can live with that because we feel that we are building a team for the future, a team that is not only going to be good in the future, but darn good now."
Darn right, but that still meant the relative result of a consolation Claudio Lopez penalty in the 79th to deny Will Hesmer the shutout rather than a statement that the Crew are beatable.
Chicago 3 - New England 0
Speaking of statements, it's the Revs now looking up at the rest of the ten-point crew, courtesy of a -2 goal differential to Toronto and Kansas City's -1. 7-0 on aggregate so far against Chicago isn't going to have Steve Nicol making with the superlatives.
"We were consistent, but consistently bad," Nicol's said. "We were second tonight. Every way you look at it, we were second. We didn’t move the ball quickly. Give them credit; they’ve outdone us tonight. They kept good spots defensively, and waited until we break down and hit us. We were second in every department: passing the ball, reading the game, challenging for the ball, finishing. You name it and we were second tonight."
Chris Rolfe opened in the 29th, with john Thorrington scoring in the 50th and Stephen King in the 76th.
"When the ball gets moving and you can find the open guy, that is the nice part of it," Chicago coach Denis Hamlett said. "With the guys moving and moving the ball around, you’re going to get looks and tonight on the first goal I think we put 10 or 15 passes together for that."
Even worse for the Revs was the return to normalcy, with Chris Albright starting and Steve Ralston coming on in the 54th minute. Taylor Twellman continues his recovery, but the rest of the squad is first choice for the first time in a long time.
"I’m not 100 percent," Ralston said." "But I felt good. It was nice to be back and be part of it and play. It’s disappointing and not the result we were looking for."
Chivas USA 0 - Houston 0
Oh well Golden Boy, at least you got some work in at the HDC. Meanwhile, Houston stays bottom of the League on goal differential. Dwayne De Rosario got a shot in early, if you count his foot connecting with Lawson Vaughn 's nose and forcing a 13th minute substitution. Chivas USA would lose Shavar Thomas in the 62nd, in most cases setting themselves up for the late pile on.
Didn't happen. Instead, Chivas USA absorbed a handful of Houston chances even after going a man down in the 82nd when Claudio Suarez bought himself a red for denying a scoring opportunity. Though Houston led 6 -1 on corners and launched more shots, this is the classic example of game with not much in it.
"Throat's sore, for the reason you think it is," said Houston coach Dominic Kinnear. "Frustrating night, a lot of chances, need a goal to break us out of our slump; obviously, they came here for a reason, tie the game, get a point. Obviously they got what they were looking for, so you know it makes it pressure for us, to try to score the first goal because if you do, it takes teams away from what they're trying to accomplish. So give credit to Chivas, they came in here with a plan, and executed, they got help by not getting punished for wasting a considerable amount of time, but it's important for us that we need to score some goals. "
Los Angeles 2 - Salt Lake 2
David Beckham has to fight back to stop Real Salt Lake from running out with all the points, with Salt Lake getting the early 2-0 lead and looking all but set to ride at least a goal for the win. Instead, here came Beckham dropping his first wonder goal in the 36th off an assist from Landon Donovan and the second in his traditional 'look, I've got a free kick. Now suffer' style all of four minutes later.
"I think we started off terrible in the first 20 minutes," Beckham said. "We didn't close after them as a team and we got scared of them. And then a couple of tackles started going in and we livened up and we started getting back into the game. I scored the two goals, of course, but it was the work that was done before that that created the enthusiasm for the team. "
Fabian Espinolda and Kenny Deuchar got RSL's goals in the 6th and the 18th, but this ended up being the latest installment of what David can do, even if they ended up splitting the points. "The play is a non-issue if a defender clears that ball out," said RSL coach Jason Kreis. "He chose to try a pass when it should have been cleared out and it happened to go to David Beckham, who put it away quite nicely." Go figure.
Dallas 0 - San Jose 0
Another bore of a game that someone will try to claim was as exciting as a four goal thriller. Not quite, with talk of shutouts when Dallas had to make one whole save and San Jose basically needing only to stop Kenny Cooper somewhat redundant.
"Take out not scoring and it was a terrific performance by us," said San Jose coach Frank Yallop. "We did everything right but score, and I do not want the guys to start to get anxious because that will come. It was a great performance by us and I think that if we perform like that we are going to win a lot of games."
Not likely, but it's a nice thought. Wonder what Dallas' Steve Morrow would say considering he had more of a reason to be optimistic: "We are happy with the performance defensively, the 'keeper was great, but we are a little disappointed that did not do more offensively to create chances. I think we had a couple of opportunities on the break in the second half where we could have done better. It was not our best night offensively." Pretty much.
San Jose joins Kansas City in the 'low number still means sellout' club, drawing a stadium filling 10,515 to their opener at Buck Shaw.
DC 0 - Colorado 2
Let's be honest and say as loudly as possible that our friends in DC are as big a disappointment as Houston so far in 2008. They're basically the same team, trying to find something that works week-to-week rather than imposing their own style. Both can go ahead and stop with the early season excuse, since they've been playing seriously since the start of the CONCACAF Club Cup.
Yes, we all know DC has issues at altitude, but this was another example of their core problems that have played out home and away. Tactical issues switching from offense to defense out of the midfield, lack of offensive production from the obvious sources, and a feeling that work rate matters more than creative choices.
"We can talk about tactics and formations all you want but if you don't show up you're not going to do well," said DC coach Tommy Soehn. "Moving forward we are going to be hard on everyone, not just the players but the staff as well. We gave away the ball continuously, setting up counters. We had backwards possession in this game, and that's not going to win games. We have to have a better mentality. We need to find a combination of guys who will go out there and give it all that they have. We have a lot of work to do."
Credit Colorado for forcing the game on their terms. Jacob Peterson scored in the 53rd and Facundo Erpen got the second in the 72nd, but the result was just as much about the Rapids defense holding Dc to all of five shots, three on frame. Colorado might have ended up with the same number of shots on goal, but two of theirs went in off of 17 chances.
"We thought that when you look at DC United, they have good players and are the type that can get a result here in Denver," said Rapids coach Fernando Clavijo. "We started the players we did because we needed energy players to put pressure on them in every single position. They have a solid tradition, but we want to start our own tradition and hopefully that can start today."
