Sept 24th: Alright. Awesome. Western Conference is completely in our own hands. All we have to do is beat Vancouver then 1st is pretty much a cake walk. Sept 30th: That was dumb. I guess we'll settle for second. Oct 7th: Well that sucks. We still have a game in hand, at least. Oct 11th: Okay, seriously stop screwing around and seal this at home. Oct 15th: You have got to be kidding me. We're not even going to host a wildcard game, are we? Oct 22nd: ******** everything.
I’ll already be in San Antonio on Thursday and its a short drive to Houston, so I guess I’ll be spending money on playoff tickets after all.
i don't recall dreading a game more. What an unceremonious end to the season. And I don't buy the whole RSL match was a wake up call. What do you need to be woken up for? Someone please find the back of the net.
Fingers crossed. Prayer chants begun. We'll need to be seriously lucky to see the next round. I plan to see if any random deities are capricious enough to support a team like ours.
Then no hope. We could at least count on Melia having one (or more) ridiculous saves to keep our low scoring attack in play. Benny appears to be really hurt - like offseason surgery to repair some nagging injury. Him not starting makes no sense otherwise. Perhaps not subbing any starters for the first four months of the season really did wear down their legs. Maybe that is part of the Benny situation. At least we have removed the mystery around when our season will end: 10:30 Thursday we can move on the the 'off season moves' thread.
I can't even believe I'm typing this, but I almost don't even want to win. Just let us quietly sulk into the shadows and don't tempt us with some false hope attached to a over-priced single game playoff ticket. These last five games have been demoralizing; I'm ready to be a neutral fan to all the playoff games that matter.
It is really sad, but this encapsulates a lot of my feelings as well. I just don't want to buy tickets for next week and watch the team fail to score. 95% of the fun of a Sporting game dies when we don't score. I just can't get jubilant about a 0-0 draw or worse. Yes, right now, I think soccer hates us. I'll gladly eat these words later though.
Agree. I've been wondering this. He's been really bad. He's not even been close on X number of attempts inside the 18. Lost some of his Vermes-bite in midfield too. Not good.
On the bright side, sure we haven't gotten results over past month or so, but we also haven't been complete rat sh** either. AND, Blvd. Nutcracker Ale is loaded with alcohol. So those two things are good for us here.
And that's a great way to cap off my thoughts as well. I'm feeling particularly pessimistic right now, but if some way we win tomorrow night, I'll be jumping up and down and buying that over-priced single-game playoff ticket faster than anyone else.
I never really noticed it was 7.8% until I got a six pack of it this weekend and drank the whole thing after our loss in Rio Tinto.
What is most frustrating is that its a repetition of the same pattern since 2013 MLS Cup. Yeah, its great to make the playoffs. Its not great to always have to travel, to always have to play in the play in game, and to always lose in the first round. Its also not great to always finish the regular season on a ramp down rather than a build up. Maybe we could learn from past mistakes? That said, if we win I will also go buy an overpriced playoff ticket and have some fun. Given the much more likely outcome of tomorrow's game (loss), I will cheer for Toronto and Atlanta, two teams that make soccer fun to watch.
Obviously the last 3 years of late season fade, late season injuries, defense falling down, then first round road playoff exit seems to be repeating again for the 4th time.....It's deja vu again and hard to have any hope. So instead of relying on hope and optimism, this time I'm rooting for a more cynical approach to a possible win. I want Murphy's Law to hit the Dynamo. I'm sorry Houston had the hurricane (I have relatives there too) - although it did help the Dynamo reschedule back to back games in 4 days vs KC later in the year when we had players injured/out at WCQ. But time for bad luck to hit the HOU soccer club. My scenario is 0-0 with HOU shots hitting woodwork, and a goal or two stolen from a bad offside call or foul call. Early HOU redcard would help too. Then shootout advance for KC. (Don't know how without Benny and Melia, but....Murphy for Houston). Cynical - but I can't see any realistic way KC wins or even stays competitive otherwise. Mostly though, I just want someone to beat TOR and stop the mlssoccer.com hype train from going into higher orbit.
But what if Atlanta wins? Toronto is legitimately a fantastic team this year. But Atlanta is much more average, with a great attacking game about once a month.
I keep seeing references to how high the SKC xG (expected goals) has been and how that's a sure sign that SKC is dangerous and ready to break out. I would say that after, what, five years making a hash out of chances from which we've expected goals, the odds are that someday we beat someone about 30-0. Our problem right now is that without Melia we're good, not great, defensively, and we don't have a single money player, who's been there and can be counted on, in the attack. We won the Cup, and we've got a crapton of allocation money, both from penny pinching and Dom. That's our hope. This group/match has all the positivity of a Sicilian funeral march right now. They were thrilling earlier this year and really looked like they were built to weather a long season. but haha, we peaked at the cup, and the downhill slide has been brutal, as once again we were not built to survive a pivotal injury. In a high pressure game like this, it would be nice to be able to count on experienced hands grabbing a goal from nothing. The most likely players to do that, Benny and Gerso, look really unlikely to add much of a spark at this point. Will they even play? Will they ever play for SKC again? Salloi, Rubio and Blessing all look to have strong futures, but they've all been in a bit of a freefall as the pressure has racheted up. Sigh. Still, we won the cup...