DCU's inaugural match against Portland on their home turf. Say hi to Perkins for us! When: Sunday, 5/29/11, 5:00pm EST Where: JELD-WEN League Records : Clean slate TV: CSN Twitter: #DCU on game day Since Portland is on the coast, I give you a baby bighorn sheep:
Stating the obvious: Portland 5-0-0 at home, amazing at set pieces. DC defend set pieces like a u12 team. Davies out I think? This all screams Portland 1 United 3 of course.
I'm looking at this as Portland has to lose at home sometime, why not now? But fo' real Kenny Cooper could be trouble.
Not sure why we're even bothering to play this--according to the Portland paper, we have no chance. http://www.oregonlive.com/timbers/i...ling_at_home_but_expecting_fierce_guests.html The article in The Oregonian (Oregon Live) is about the tough teams Portland will face after D.C. leaves. Timbers rolling at home but expecting fierce guests The Portland Timbers' 1-0 win against Columbus on Saturday night extended their home unbeaten streak to five games. The Timbers will likely extend the run to six games on Sunday when they host D.C. United. If the Timbers get past 3-4-3 D.C., two potential streak-snapping games surface. ...
That's messed up. Add that to my personal loathing of HGH guzzling Kenny Cooper and my exorbitant psychotherapy bills directly related to Troy Perkins' performance last year and I'm really praying that DCU crushes these ladies. I want to see THAT look on Troy Perkins' face.
Portland is definitely beatable. I don't think their team is much better than ours. We just need to defend well on set pieces.
if he knows the result in advance, the least he could do is provide the score so we can get some bets in... I'm feeling like Najar is ready to go off soon.
When was the last month that we defended set pieces well consistently? October-November 2004? I think we can pull off a tie if we are not as injured as it sounds we might be (like if Simms, Tino and Dax are actually > 90%)
Happened to listen to a Timbers podcast last night: http://ddy3at84ppzdk.cloudfront.net/TI/TIE11.mp3 Has some pregame stuff, including an interview with Chad Ashton. It was pretty disconcerting when Ashton had genuine trouble coming up with an answer to the question "What does DC United do well?" (starts around 13:15).
So let me state the obvious -- like most DC fans after the last couple of seasons I'm having a hard time answering the question "What does Chad Ashton do well?"
Referee: Geoff GAMBLE MLS Career Stats: 1 game, 5.0 Y/g, 0 R MLS 2011: 1 game, 5.0 Y/g, 0 R Assistant Referees: Craig LOWRY and Eric PROCTOR Fourth Official: Silviu PETRESCU All-time Portland matches with Gamble as referee: FIRST MATCH All-time D.C. United matches with Gamble as referee: FIRST MATCH
HA HA! To be fair, though. How many coaches tip off an opponent about strengths and weaknesses before a match? Could be he was just surprised by the question and wasn't sure how to answer without saying too much and giving information to the Timbers, or even saying too little and insulting his own team. Although perhaps I am being too charitable!
Pull hamstrings? Get hernias? Forget to mark Taylor Twellman? Not feeling optimistic about this West Coast swing.
In a pure fist fight Spencer would beat Olsen ... And that's kind of the way it'll play out on the field too ... We'll probably lose in an all out physical battle, but maybe if we can just keep the ball and weave through the giants ... I think this is a perfect game to start Fred in the middle to help us do that.
I really do hope Brettschneider gets the start over Ngwenya on Sunday. Apart from that my sights are set pretty low I guess. A draw would be nice.
http://www.betbrain.com/football/united-states/mls/portland-timbers-v-d-c--united--washington-/ Just sayin'
tough call people. Is a road game against a team playing well at home really the best time to start Fred in the central midfield? Or do you stick with two defensive central mids, likely limiting DCU scoring chances but hoping to avoid conceding goals? Tough decision for Olsen. Really hope we score and keep Perkins quiet. Nothing against the guy, I just recall some quotes from him suggesting that he didn't get a fair shake on is second tour here in DC. I feel it's simple. If he played better with DC and showed that he was worth the salary, they would have kept him.
Tino has been scratched with a concussion suffered in practice Wednesday according to this: http://www.dcunited.com/news/2011/05/united-in-portland