First game in a while where I didn't have a good time. Crap play, irritatingly poor service in the parking lot (attendant's car blocking traffic, another attendant walking down the middle of the road mindlessly), and really nothing to be excited about for the whole game. While I'll certainly use my tickets for the rest of the season, I won't be buying additional tickets or encouraging others to go.
They might be "competing", but this team sucks. It's a magic blend of age, inexperience, lack of skill, and lack of speed.
No, he's right. The team worked REALLY hard. I've rarely seen a DCU team put as much pressure on an opposing back line as we did tonight. They ran themselves ragged out there. The problem is that we're missing that crucial bit of skill that can get us a goal. Without it, we can pressure, work hard, etc.all we want, but one goal kills us. What we're missing, sad to say, is quality. Add some real talent to a team that plays this hard, and we win a bunch.
I think Matt's observation is quite good. This is a team that scraps, plays hard, but just doesn't have the skill to compete. Tonight the main positive points were: the relentless pressure from Allsop and Cristman; Simms and Morsink clogging the middle and Pena and Talley cleaning up all but one of the messes. I also think Graye has the tools to be a beast, I like what I've seen so far. Hamid -- he was beaten near post, that goal is on him 100%, that said, you get that type of brain fart with 18 year olds. The negatives: Khumalo and Castillo -- friggin' nothing from the wings. Wallace, jeebus Wells Thompson was able to spin him around. Maybe he should play on the left in midfield because he can't defend at an MLS level. The bottom line, neither Simms nor Morsink can orchestrate anything to break down a defense. Moreno can, but he can't go 90. Najar might be able to someday, but he's only 17. The injured players who are near returning -- Jakovic, Pontius and Quaranta don't address that issue. Until that issue is fixed, DCU will be hard pressed to score a goal a game. My biggest concern is that Dave Kasper is the guy tasked with fixing the personnel on this team.
Attendance is looking brutally empty. They had a bunch of kids from teams. And the weather was perfect. I mean it's at the point where I wonder w/the stadium issue if the team survives in DC. As I said 4 games ago this team is in the saddest shape I've ever seen. My suggestion was to fire the coach bring in a big name to fill the seats and prepare for next year. Same applies; this season is lost.
Yeah, well, you're prone to great fits of despair. I don't like this losing, but I can certainly see improvement in our play. We're going to be really bad for a long time. Then, if we bring someone in, we're still going to be bad, since one player isn't going to magically fix all this.
Replacing Castillo would be an instant improvement. We were actually joking around in the stands that we'd be better off starting 10 men to keep him off the field.
+1, +2, +3, +4, +5. Matt summed it up. Castillo has to be one of the worst players to wear the kit for DC United. He was dogging it on the pitch most of the time. I saw three hard runs. He was trying to let the left back Wallace do his dirty work against Marvell Freaking Wynne. I saw him wander into the center to await a cross from Wallace. 21 other players on the pitch taller than him, mind you, and he's not Michael Owen in disguise. He got in another yelling match, this time with Morsink. If on-field attitude played any part in Josh Wicks' dismissal, then put Castillo on the first plane back to San Salvador. At some point you have to admire a keeper taking posession of the defense, even if it is wild-eyed crazy Wicks-style. If there is anything known as locker-room justice, I home Jaime decides to mete some out across the back of Castillo's head. About the 79th minute Christian was doing his best Bobby Convey windmill impression on the wing. Moreno runs halfway across the field to pass the ball to him. Castillo proceeds to turn away from goal and the attack and starts running back towards the midfield with the ball. He gets caught in posession and falls over clutching the back of his head trying to draw a foul. It was a clean win by Colorado. This douche proceeds to walk up and down the field holding the back of his head like he was hit with a 2x4. Unfreakingbelievable. I wish MLS hadn't agreed to guaranteed contracts. Because then you could cut his lazy ass without impunity. We're probably on the hook for a number greater than the hundreds of El Salvadorean "fans" that never come to games except to see El Salvadorean players will ever contribute to United's coffers. Even they have discovered what a fraud he is. Speaking of fraud, the little kid that was next to me kept yelling for "Castro" instead of "Castillo". Is it possible there's a low-level player from El Salvador named Christian Castro that we picked up instead of Christian Castillo? Washington N*ts-style failure to confirm a birth certificate and all that? I'd love to take up a collection to see if we can buy out Castillo's contract from the team and sit him for the rest of the year. Consider me good for a thousand or so. The second Pontius is healthy should be the last second Castillo sees the pitch for United. Thx, Jay!
^^^^This. And Barklage was even worse than Boyzzz. I don't think Brandon completed a single pass to one of his own teammates. Jaime showed a brief flash of the young Jaime, but he just doesn't have the motor anymore. This is going to be a long, ugly season.
Sad, but I said the same thing to Mrs. Winoman, except I was talking about the Barklage for Khumalo sub.
We still can. While some contracts are guaranteed, loans sure as hell aren't. I say he's gone by June, assuming we can't dupe another team into taking him.
Thank god I wasn't the only one to see how bad he was tonight. Seriously, you can say what you want about everyone else on the pitch for United, but for Castillo to have stood out as badly as he did, well... It takes more. Great news about the loan. Hopefully it gets cancelled pronto. At this point a certain "Hot" Rod Dyachenko looks like a better option. Thx, Jay!
Doesn't every team in MLS spend about the same in player salaries? Where exactly is DC Utd's money being spent?
This team has improved from butt awful to just good enough to lose. With the exception of Castillo's pitiful free kick attempt, I thought he had the most useful performance I've seen from him yet. However, there are lots of people here whose views I respect who feel otherwise and I can't really argue. It's time to send him back to Leon as soon as possible. The El Salvadorean crowd left several game ago and Castillo won't be missed. 13,000 on a beautiful Saturday night and the first loss to Colorado at home in over a decade. These are serious signs of decay on and off the field. Ignoring the merits of showing Kasper and Onalfo the door for what has happened on the field, at what point do you just get rid of them to keep fan interest and attendance from collapsing?
And another thing... Just like I talked about in the pre-match thread, this was another case of United bossing the first half and capitulating in the second. This team is not fit for 90 minutes. The coaching sucks. The tactics sucks. The players suck. The stadium situation sucks, both the current one and the lack of a future one. The ownership situation sucks. I say fire everybody who thinks they are in charge and start over. ps. Is Castillo here just for the free dental work United gave him and some possible Sports Hernia/Hamstring surgery with a free trip to Germany thrown in? Thx, Jay!
I don't know, maybe it' the World Cup coming up, but I have to say this is the least enthused I've ever been about a DC United team. For me this season started off with a sense of "is that all there is?" In the off season we jettisoned some talent (albeit erratic and frustrating talent in the form of Fred) to bring Perkins back. OK, I wasn't too bummed about loosing Fred and Perkins seemed like he could be helpful (but lets not forget some of the howlers he let in while he was here before). Then we get rid of Emilio and Gomez. On the talent scale, those guys were toward the top of the readings for DC United. They weren't world beaters, but the other players on the team were'nt that good. With the loss of talent, what did we get? Let's see, Castillo (who looked good in San Salvador against the US team), Pen~a (an ancient but experienced defender), Alsopp (an Australian striker who was playing at home and could not cut it overseas), Carey Talley (who had been discarded by his team), Morsink (another cast off), Christman (a cast off), and Najar (a kid with no professional experience). I like Pen~a even if he is old. In some games he's the best distributor of the ball on the field for DC. I like how Hamid has risen to the occassion even though he is terribly young and unseasoned. Perkins has not impressed. He always seemed too quiet and passive to be a leader. This season has been unimpressive. Castillo is a disappointment. Alsopp has had his moments but he can only capitalize on what is created for him. Christmas seems to be an OK player but looks to me like a MLS journeyman. Talley has filled in because Jakovic has been injured and frankly wasn't that great before the injury. Morsink plays with energy but that isn't enough. Najar has played like a skilled 17 year old with no pro experience playing against real adults. The players that were supposed to step up -- Quaranta, Kumalo, Pontius -- for injury or other reason have not done so. Moreno is another year older. I am not surprised by the results. I'm not down on the effort. But the video at the beginnig of the game about how it takes more, which in the video focuses on fight, courage, etc., needs to have some more footage added showing blown chances, botched passes, defensive lapses, and then at the conclusion of the scene, it needs to say "more talent." This team needs more talent. And I'm afraid our biggest deficit -- even more than what appears on the field -- is in the front office. Dave Kaspar is the guy that got us into this mess. I have no confidence that he's the one to get us out of it. As I said, I feel less involved with the current team and find myself with a sense of detachment that I've never felt before. Not good. We can fire Onalfo -- and I think we have to at this point -- but the fish is rotting from the head as Dukakas famously said. We're not going to fix this mess unless Mr. Chang decides that some heads need to roll.
Post Game Quotes are up. Here's the first one Forward Adam Cristman - On United’s inability to finish: “I don’t know if it is a matter of clicking or continuing to work on crossing and finishing, or maybe we all need to have a meeting to clearly define every detail of everyone’s role. Everyone has to understand everyone else’s role because our timing is just not there. If I know that a ball is coming first time I know I need to time my run immediately, if a ball is coming from the wing I time my run differently. Right now we are all over the place, and it is frustrating because we are so close.”
So it seems it was a personally good thing that I was at my son's wedding in Richmond celebrating with Jack rocks rather than being in RFK tonight. That seems to be the gist of what I'm reading. The problem is that I only have one kid left to get married, and that is in October, so I'm quickly running out of excuses.
Others may have seen it, but I was driving back from Montgomery and missed the entire game. My opinion is based on all his previous performances and my assumption that tonight's game was more of the same. He showed some promise early in the season, but, unfortunately, that promise has been exposed as "style" without substance.