Total and utter bull***t. That's what this game was. No excuse from any party can pardon that effort from our team, and what's worse, the only player with an ounce of care for the outcome (Curtin) was SUBBED OUT by Sarachan! Also, in a move that aboslutely boggled the mind, especially with Andy "Black Hole" Williams never allowing offensive progress past him in the midfield, down two goals, in desperate need of offense - WE PUT IN ORLANDO FU**ING PEREZ! Now, regardless of how you feel personally about Orlando or about his skill level, it simply doesn't matter. He's out and out the wrong position for our purposes at that time...we might as well have put in a second keeper. The time begged to be one to put Bolaños is, there was nothing to lose and everything to gain...and nothing. Does Sarachan lack that much confidence in this guy, and if so, why the hell did we get him? THAT was a prime situation begging for such a change. Also, high time has come to bench DaMarcus. He's still good, but it's almost as if he's become complacent. Bench him, maybe use him as a sub and hope it does for his game what it seems to have done for Landon this year. And please, if AW starts Tuesday, I'm going to retch. A terrible effort on all fronts. I may not have seen the second half of the home leg in Chicago, but Dallas wanted the win Saturday several times more than we wanted one in both games combined.
In hindsight, it was obvious that the team didn't care too much about this game. With that in mind, I would have liked to have seen Sarachan go with the all young guy/new guy lineup. Seeing as how Pause was the best player out there, and Capano looked good, we should have had Futagaki, Dipsy, Jaqua and Bolanos get the start. If you're not going to take an opponent seriously, go all the way. Chris Armas had perhaps his worst game ever of his professional career. I think he'd have played better a month after his ACL surgery with the staph infection. Kelly Gray atoned a little bit with the rocket off the crossbar, but letting Nhlecko beat him to that ball in the corner that led to the second goal sealed the deal as much or more than Boca and DMB suddenly and inexplicably running away from Eddie Johnson. A 1-0 Dallas lead would not have been a cause for panic going into the half. Credit to Colin Clarke, though, because Jeff Cassar seemed to do a much better job of organizing his defense than D.J. Countess did. At one point, around the 30-minute mark, we almost realized that the first entry pass to the forwards was getting shut down, and had a series of lateral passes that created some space, but then we never did it again. But yeah, we sucked. IMHO, this one was meaningless, as long as the team wakes the **** up. Later, COZ
At first, self-mutilation seemed the best way to cleanse myself of feelings of shame and self-loathing. However, a night of heavy drinking and a street fight cleared my head, and now I can offer a more rational opinion on the game. A plausible idea was proposed by your friend and mine, Craig "The Oi!-fficer" Nykiel. Zach was vacationing in sunny Cancun, and was replaced by his twin brother, Mack Thornton. Mack is a good boy, but slow, and always looked up to Zach. It was a personal favor. Razov and Ralph were replaced by Bill S. Preston, Equire, and Ted "Theodore" Logan. While their dreams of heavy metal stardom are admirable, and their slacker antics amusing, I don't think they were the right choice for the starting 11. Maybe half-time subs. Fire Works for Kids convinced Dave and Co. to donate the game to the impoverished youth of Dallas. Seriously, though, 5-1 New England, 2-0 Dallas? Why can't we beat teams that suck?
So I've plopped down in my recliner after of toiling away the entire Saturday in the yard cutting grass, trimming bushes, etc. Got a cold beer, nacho chips and organic salsa next to me and the kids are upstairs watching some video. Needless to say, after the first goal I'm thinking to myself, "Oh hell." So my 5-year-old comes downstairs, probably after hearing me swearing up a storm. "Which team is winning?" "The red team." "Yeah, they're playing better." "grump" "I want the red team to win because red is my favorite color." "But the red team is Dallas, and the white team is the Fire." "The red team is going to win." "Get upstairs or I'm going to spank you!" This is one time I have to agree with you Liam. Every pass was a back pass, after what seemed like an eternity of a pause in which he decided what to do. We've got a player that has been described by other Fire players as a Nowak-type offensive midfielder and we left him home?!! I said the same thing (only not so loud that the kids could hear upstairs. He's displaying some of his speed, but no ability to get the ball past anyone. If he's worried he's going to get injured and not get a ticket to Europe, he'd better realize his highlight reel is about a minute long right now. Bolanos!
I think I speak for all of the MDSC when I completely and absolutely support your choice to threaten physical retribution for support of Dallas, however innocent it may have been. You have to curtail such behavior early, or else it may bloom into support for Columbus. Dallas is what you might call a "gateway team." On the other side of that gateway is a slippery slope indeed. D.A.R.E. - Dallas Approval Resistance Education (brought to you by a grant from MDSC in conjunction with FireWorks for Kids)
Most of the analysis here is spot on! Especially the comment about Perez. The cries must have been going up in unison across Chicago on that one. The one question about Bolanos. Since he's just come on to the roster, is he eligible for the USOC competition?
I offer that lunchbox that they handed out with the astronaut looking Burn players on it as evidence that they target young children and try to suck them into a life of pork-rinds, plastic fields, and haircuts like Gratziani.
You are real humanitarians Thanks for the pity win. It's nice to keep the Brimstone Cup another year since we will most likely miss the playoffs. The coaching change was too little too late.
I agree he should be benched. He absolutely watched Eddie Johnson walk past him to plant himself, tree-like in the six-yard box. And this was just the most prominent example of his lackluster effort since about June 1. Hey, Beas, if you can't be bothered to show up for your club, what makes you think this will impress [insert foreign club here]? Right now, on the basis of performance, he's closer to playing with Jamar than playing in Europe.
You bet, he hasn't played for anyone else in the OC, so he's ours. Same with Metro and their new Polish guy.
What announcement was/is this? Across the country! When I saw Perez coming in I yelled out "What the hell is HE going to do?"
I think it absolutely has to be that we don't take them seriously, and there's a lot more to it than just those two games. New column tomorrow on the Fire site that will go a bit more in depth. Yeah, I'm shameless like that. Why are you surprised. Later, COZ
I think it was something to the effect of "BigSoccer.com moderator Halamadrid knows something about the team that you don't, and he wants to make sure you know it and act accordingly." Harkes said it right before the first commercial break. Sorry, Liam, but I have a long history of hating it when you do that. Later, COZ
Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't "the big secret" (oooh) in the paper, for everyone to read? It's not like I was being sneaky or anything. I'd also like to add:
Re: Re: You are real humanitarians They keep it. We didn't win it by the agreed rules, plus there's the matter of given our performance, we don't deserve it. End. Of. Story. There will be clarification of the rules this offseason so that this doesn't happen in the future. I was under the impression such measures were established already, but there's nothing to do about it now. Book is closed on it for this year.
Re: Re: Re: You are real humanitarians Puhlease. One bad game (no matter how bad it was) does not mean that we don't deserve the BC, which is based on meetings during the year.
How do they keep it? What is the rule? That if the record is tied, the previous winner gets to hold onto it? Thats retarded! Should be goal aggregate.
I agree that it should be aggregate (and I thought it was), but it isn't. They keep it because apparently there was never any agreed upon tiebreakers (at least that there are a record of) and barring any the cup stays with the holder. It sucks, but that's the way it is. Next year there won't be this problem (and frankly, there wouldn't have been this year if the guys had shown any effort Saturday whatsoever).
Personally, I can go either way on this issue. On the one hand, I'm amenable to establishing an aggregate goals tiebreaker. However, that's as far as I'd like to go in terms of tiebreakers. I wouldn't want to do away goals for a very practical reason. There's a greater-than-zero chance that the Burn and the Fire will play an uneven number of games during a season, meaning that one team will get more games at home than the other and conversely, the other team will have more opportunities for away goals. On the one hand, I have no problem with the current system. If you want to take the Brimstone Cup from the current holders, you gotta win it outright. Moreover, as a practical matter, while the players appreciate the Brimstone Cup matches as being "different" from the other matches, at the end of the day, they're not focused on how many goals they need to score, they're just focused on the result. To them, a 1-0 win is the same as a 2-0 win is the same as a 3-0 win, and conversely, a 2-1 loss is the same as a 3-1 loss is the same as a 4-1 loss. So I'm not sure that it makes much sense to establish an aggregate goals tiebreaker when that tiebreaker wouldn't even be a priority to the players on the field. All the players care about is the three points. It's not like the playoffs where the aggregate goals are all that's going to matter. Whichever way we go, we'll be sure to clarify the whys and the wherefores.