Official DC United vs Chicago Fire PRE Match Thread

Fire lineup last week:

----------- Thornton
------ Gray Curtin Bocanegra
Whitfield Armas Williams Perez
-------------- Beasley
---------- Faria Capano

 

If we can't have flames, then how can we talk about the Fire?

Sachin

 

Knave I don't think the game is on CSN. They only have FSW listed on the website. They are actually showing the WUSA game over us.

 

I saw the Fire vs Revs match this past week and here are some observations. Probably the best two players for the Fire were Beasley and Williams. Beasley was all over the place and looked dangerous on the attack. They playd a lot of their younger players and the run of play was rather choppy. Their defense looked pretty solid.

I'm coming out for the home opener and looking forward to the game. Does anyone have the long term forcast for the weekend?

 

weather.com is saying rain on Friday and cloudy on Saturday and Sunday. High of 75 on Saturday with a low of 52. Chance of precipitation is 20%.

 

Chi-1
DC-0

Ugh.

 

DCU 2 Fire 1
BE THERE!

 

Let's hope for an honest to goodness tie this time.

DC 1 Chi 1

 

i am going to be unusually optimistic and say 3-1 actually. i think the home opener, the decent performance last week and the best home crowd in MLS will push our boys to an unexpected effort.

 

I am with r&B. We kick their midwestern asses 3-1. Earnie scores in the first 20 minutes, Tino just after halftime and Bobby late to wrap it up. They get one from Boca.

 

I'm so sad to be out of town for the home opener...

The crowd should be awesome. I'm going with DC 2, Chicago 1.

have a blast!


jk

 

i think even though they lost last weekend, they played decent. i think this year is going to be santino's year to really shine. i predict 3-1 (d.c. united). see you all there.

 

Same here. Have fun guys. DC-2 Chi.-2

 

I believe this week Nicky R. willl redeem himself (or at least I hope!!) DCU plays a good strong game with the players we have and we the good guys win 2-1! Afterwards proceeded by a wild time in lot 8 with all the Barra Brava crazies!!! Ha Ha

 

Sadly, I have to be out of town this weekend as well--won't even have access to FSW to watch on TV. Sigh.

That said, have some damn faith people. The team played with some real heart last weekend, Nick won't have two crappy performances in a row, we're at home, and we're going to rock some chicagoan ass. Sez I:

DCU 2-1 CHI

Goals from Earnie and Tino; some Fire drone nets one late to make the result look more respectable than they deserve. A result that does not reflect the quality of a dominating performance.

 

my take on the season and the strength of the league, if we ain't beating chicago at home, we aren't winning many games at all.

 

I think this is a very good matchup for DCU. Here's why.

1. DCU (regardless of how many we play in the back) will play 5 in the middle. Given the Fire's setup, that makes for an incredibly congested middle of the field. That has several implications.
--Andy Williams (with his propensity to dribble) will have problems b/c there will be too many bodies);
--DMB will have less space;
--physical size in midfield starts to become an issue as well as the ability to hold the ball (and I'm scared of DMB with a lot of open-space, less so when there are many bodies);
--if the middle is congested, than wing play matters more. And I think the ability of Convey and Olsen to push forward will be very good given that Whitfield and Perez are fine players but aren't Klein or Ralston (ie: offensive threats that force them to defend more). Also, if I were Sarachan, I'd play DMB on the wing for this match to try and take Olsen out of the attack and allow DMB to play more of a defensive role where he's very underrated.

2. I would worry about Chicago counters. Faria is very good at this. Our backline isn't fast. DMB will try to sneak forward (the big plus of playing him in an A-mid/withdrawn forward role). That's worrysome.

3. I think on corners and free kicks, Chicago (if they choose to sneak their big backline forward) will cause some real danger b/c Bocanegra, Gray, and Curtin are 3 big targets, all good in the air, and you can't just try to deny only one of 2 or more are up (and with Armas, DMB, Perez, Whitfield--they've got guys to go back and cover for them when they pull up on restarts).

4. I think the run of play significantly favors DCU. I think the lineup we fielded against KC is better technically than Chicago's. I think it is more experienced. Armas may try to match up against Etcheverry (what they've done in the past) but this time we have several other serious threats to distribute if Marco is denied the ball (Convey, Stewart, Kovalenko).

5. I would not be surprised if we played a 3-man backline, moved Namoff or Alegria to holding or D-mid (along side Kovalenko) and gave them the marking assignment of taking out DMB so we're playing 10v10. And then Stewart moves to withdrawn forward. We then end up starting the same 11 as v.KC but the formation and feel of the lineup is very, very different (and more attack oriented).

I think the only way Chicago wins is if they get an early goal so we push forward and give them lots of space to counter. I question their ability as a team to create chances in the run of play.

 

If Chicago stick with this sort of lineup, I think we can beat 'em. The key to the game will lie in Beasley, if they play him as an attacking mid, then I'm pretty confident we can put men behind the ball and neutralize him and the Fire attack. We proved last week our makeshift defense could deal with speedy fowards. If Chicago put DMB on the wing, then I think Ben can keep him check like Bobby did for Klein last week.

Really all thats needed is an effort like that of last Saturday. If Nick clears out the cobwebs, and we push foward a bit (now we know that our backline is pretty solid, considering the loss of Reyes and Ivanov), I think we can take this one by a comfortable margin. Despite the loss Saturday, I think the boys will be boosted by the home crowd and the confidence that they almost nicked the win off of a tough team at a ground where our record is pretty dismal. That being said:

DCU-3
Chi-1

 

Rimando's got it all out of his system, Marco is back and Tino is coming on:

DC -- 2

Chi -- 0

 

Hopefully next season the home opener won't be over Easter weekend.

 

I would think that if healthy CJ Brown would return to the starting lineup. He had a sprained neck last week, but isn't listed on this week's injury report, that I could see.

I'm not one for game predictions any more, but stopping DMB and keeping track of Faria will be key (yeah I'm stating the obvious).

 

3-2 us. They draw first blood, Earnie hustles his way to a goal just before the half, a trash goal by us, a Quaranta goal, a late Chicago goal. I'm fairly certain that's how it'll go.

Actually, I feel that if we can get enough guys playing offense, we'll get the opportunities and the good fortune that we've craved lo these many years. To do that, we're going to have to take some risks in the back and with our injuries, we'll let in a couple. I just hope they're both by Beasley so at least I'll have the solace of a US Nat having a good day.

 

I can't believe that no one has mentioned that Dema and Stoitchkov will be back against their old team. I think that Stoitchkov is cleared to play in this game and I could see him coming on as a sub and giving an assist.