Who: D.C. United v. Montreal Impact What: MLS Round 9 When: Saturday, May 6, 6:00 PM (6:00?) Where: RFK Stadium, Washington, DC Why: Playoff Revenge Fun fact, D.C. is 3-3-2 when I make the match threads this season. Standings (W-L-T) D.C.: 8th in East, 13th in MLS, 3-3-2, 11 Pts., -4 Montreal: 10th in East, 20th in MLS, 1-3-4, 6 Pts., -3 Form (Old to Recent) D.C.: WWLDW Montreal: DLWDL Injuries D.C.: Klenofsy (Knee surgery), NDL (Hernia), Birnbaum (Head scrambled), Vincent (Surgery complications), Nyarko (Leg) Montreal: Mancuso (read something), unknown Suspensions: D.C.: None Montreal: Unknown Projected Lineup Hamid Franklin Opare Boswell Kemp Jeffrey Harkes Acosta Sam Le Toux Neagle Bench: Worra, Robinson, Tissot, Marcelo, Beuscher, Mullins, Otiz Themes Star Wars Night D.C. revenge from playoff dump last season First of 3 straight home matches v. 3 of the 5 bottom teams in the East. 9 Points should be the target.
What's on Tap https://www.dcunited.com/post/2017/05/03/whats-tap-united-v-montreal-impact Preview https://www.dcunited.com/post/2017/05/03/preview-week-10 Benny https://www.dcunited.com/post/2017/05/03/ben-olsen-talks-media-ahead-dcvmtl Lloyd Sam https://www.dcunited.com/post/2017/05/03/lloyd-sam-previews-montreal-impact
FAIL! Beer not mentioned once I am still mad as hell about the last time we played these guys at RFK and demand revenge. I hope United remembers that the way we beat ATL last week is exactly what Montreal did in that game. I'm not sure there are even baby animals in Montreal, as animals don't speak french, so they grind them all up into the poutine because at least the fries are french cut. Or maybe they simply use them to provide "flavor" for your coffee: DCU: 4 MTL: 3 (2 late goals because United live to cause me late-game stress)
Gonna miss this one -- charity event at the place where my daughter works. I missed the Atlanta game on TV last Sunday -- maybe another win in my "absence."
Here's my scouting report: Dominic Oduro is fast and dumb. Piatti is slow and smart. Felipe doesn't play for them anymore but he still sucks manatee balls. Evan Bush is underrated. Laurent Ciman isn't.
Ooooops, I've been telling people the game is at 7 - now I see 6. Oh well, serves anyone right to have believed me Ran into a nice girl from Montreal at the brewery last night and told her and her husband about the game.
If this season is any guide, we won't show up for the first 10 minutes of each half. Allez les Rouge et Noir!
I'm hoping for the first blow out win of the season. The first real comfortable game where the team gets its groove back. That's no disrespect to Montreal. But when you get a signature win like we did in Atlanta last week, you have to back it up and show it wasn't a fluke. Two players I'm expecting to show up are Neagle and Mullins. It's long overdue that these two start contributing to the effort. I see a Le Toux goal assisted by Neagle and a Boswell goal off a corner by Sam in the first half. Then Mullins comes in around 60th minute and scores off a give and go counter with Acosta. 3-0 to the good guys. Party in the stands.
It's not exactly optional. At some point this season you need some convincing wins. No better time than back to back home games against the two worst teams in the conference. Because of the way the East is shaping up this year, our table position is pretty tenuous. The East seems top heavy and stronger than the West which means that a .500 is not a slam dunk playoff berth like previous seasons. If you can't bank those points now, it'll be a lot harder in the future. Our schedule only gets harder, including a 4 game road swing this summer and another 3 game road swing in fall including destinations like Dallas, Portland and Seattle. We'll need some margin for error to stay above water. But of course in the end I'll celebrate 3 points no matter how they happen. If Benny grinds out a 1-0 win with a fluke deflected goal, so be it. The important part is banking points now when the schedule is blessing us with home games.
No surprises in the lineup ... Hamid, Kemp, Boswell, Opare, Franklin, Acosta, Jeffrey, Harkes, Neagle, Le Toux, Sam If there's any surprise it's that there's only 6 on the bench. Maybe Büscher was a late injury scratch? We have : Worra, Robinson, Odoi-Atsem, Sarvas, Mullins, Ortiz VAMOS UNITED!
Well that wasn't pretty. That goal started off a horrendous clearance from Franklin, and neither Jeffrey or Harkes staying home. One of those two needs to stay at home all the time. The other needs to man mark Piatti because he's killing us on the counter. Especially on our set pieces either Jeffrey or Harkes needs to mark Piatti because they counter on us every time. Also there is no activity on the left. Especially after the goal I can't remember any touches from Neagle or Kemp in the attacking 3rd. We can't just totally ignore that side of the field. Everything is going through the right with Sam and Franklin and they're getting crowded out because their entire defense is shifting over because we can't keep them honest on the left. And finally Le Toux has been invisible. We definitely need to change the game off the bench. Mullins for Le Toux at some point. Also maybe Ortiz for Neagle and Sarvas for Harkes.
Oh Mullins ... a sitter from 6 yards out rolled to the keeper. That was the moment. When is he going to start his season?
Opare keeps getting his head on our set pieces but he's not keeping the ball in play. He's floating every header out of bounds.
Neagle had a shockingly bad game. In fact, other than Acosta, pretty much everyone in the forward 5 had, at a minimum, a mediocre game. That's the game you look back on at the end of the season and say, "and that's why we missed the playoffs by a point." That's not a very good Impact team, and we rarely threatened -- and when we did, it almost always came down to just Acosta.
The whole team (save Acosta) seemed to make the wrong choice given every opportunity. Wrong pass at the wrong time with the wrong pace. I felt like Acosta just got more and more frustrated as the ball was sent the wrong way. We looked unskilled.
Everybody was slow to the ball, and this was definitely not a good game from Letoux. Add to that they were hacking Acosta at every opportunity, with few fouls called, this had stinker written all over it. I thought Harkes was better than last game, but that's almost damning with faint praise.
Pathetic. Honestly. We looked like we were down a man starting at minute 1. The first half was embarrassing. Props to Worra on some great stops. Neagle needs to wake up or get benched. He has looked poor this season. Franklin the same. Marcelo brings nothing I can see. San didn't impress, but nobody really did. Acosta needs somebody - anybody - to meet him in the soccer IQ zone. Nobody seems to have any ability to think fast or with any sophistication. A hard working team with no smarts isn't good enough at this point.
Nobody challenged Ballou Tabla on their goal. Our defenders backed away (keeping an attacker onside) and gave him time to pick his spot. (BTW - Greg Andrulis, who I talked to at halftime, said much the same. He had a strange career: MLS Coach of the Year and fired at least twice). I finally saw some good stuff from Harkes, but then he was pulled - - for Marcelo. Why? We needed to attack, and I see Marcelo as more dmid. As soon as he came in he made his first pass - to Montreal.