While leaving the stadium, yesterday's result felt like a kick in the nuts. At the beginning of the week I was hoping for four points out of six and the club got it, albeit a steep price (losing Rimando and Olsen). Move on.
Re: Why Did Ray Leave For The PK? Disn't notice. Superstition perhaps? Sometimes I can't even watch and yesterday I bowed and waited for the crowd to tell me what happened. Whatever works, right? Bill
Richie Williams twin brother My daughter and I were saying the same thing Martins should be given more opportunities his pass back to Dema should have sealed the game.
- When did the parallel and back pass creep back into this teams offensive strategy, again? - When are players going to pick their heads up and look for guys making vertical runs into danger areas? - Since when does 13 cards reflect a man "in charge of a match"? Misconduct Summary: MET -- Eddie Pope (caution; Reckless Foul) 5 DC -- Mike Petke (caution; Pushing, Holding) 10 MET -- Richie Williams (caution; Reckless Foul) 29 DC -- Brandon Prideaux (caution; Reckless Foul) 32 MET -- Steve Jolley (caution; Pushing, Holding) 39 DC -- Ryan Nelsen (caution; Pushing, Holding) 39 MET -- Clint Mathis (caution; Reckless Foul) 41 DC -- Dema Kovalenko (caution; Pushing, Holding) 48 MET -- Ricardo Clark (caution; Tackle from Behind) 49 MET -- Clint Mathis (caution; Reckless Foul) 87 MET -- Clint Mathis (ejection; Second Caution) 87 DC -- Galin Ivanov (caution; Reckless Foul) 89 MET -- Jonny Walker (caution; Delaying a Restart) 99 - No matter what any "he said/she said" occurs between Metrosucks fans and La Norte/BB/SE the first and overriding factor is that coming down to confront opposing fans is out of line. - While beating the Metrosucks is always a great thing the next three games are the most important. Two against Columbus and one against New England. By keeping both teams behind United they are in good postion. Repeat after me. There is no real home field advantage in the first round. There is no away goals rule to worry about so just out score the opposition. The second and third seeds only host the conference title game if the fourth seed wins so there is no difference between second and third just third and fourth.
-Kennedy sucked, but he didn't lose us the game. A total lack of offensive intelligence and loads of lazy passes lost us the game. -Gotta feel for Doug Warren. Kid played outstanding. -Ivanov's late foul was stupid. It was a 2-on-4. If he had forced the play inside, he had lots of help, but he allowed the play to go outside where he was stranded. -*#*#*#*#ing Quintanilla has to grow up, learn how to form a wall and stop picking up the ball after he fouls a guy. But when one of your assistant coaches rushes the officials between regulation and overtime, you can see why players don't learn to handle themselves better on the field. -Lazy, lazy, lazy passing. -They had four changes to their lineup. We had three, one of them being the keeper. With such a short turnaround, I think that had something to do with the ending. Ben's injury put us in a hole playig on short rest. -Who's the ticketing genius who put away fans right above La Norte. I wish I could say I'm surprised.
Exactly. They should have been put in Section 301. Safe, out of the way and basically the same view point of the field.
I held off on the first few posts of yours, but now can't bite my tongue any longer. You thought our midfield played well AND that Warren was never really tested? Wow. I guess the shrooms caused me to see all those passes to the MetroStars and that wicked free kick Doug tipped over the bar. Our midfield sucked and Doug saved our bacon a couple of times.
Another useless observation from the quiet side: At the end of regulation, the guys on the bench barely moved. Nelsen was screaming for some water, and they barely moved. Finally Carroll slowly picked one up and walked it to him. I don't think Ray should be fired, but hate how he has handled the youth. I'm not a fan of Trask's strategies, and I think adding a guy like Hristo to the mix has totally gutted the personality of this team Bottom line - when they are winning, these guys work together. When they are not, they do not always have what it takes to quickly pick themselves up and work for each other.
That is an unfortunate typo. At least, I assume it's a typo. I think that losing Olsen is a bigger blow than losing Nicky. I feel confident that Warren can handle things pretty well. But Benny is hard to replace. Did anyone else notice the quiet side coming alive toward the end of the game? I think during some corner kicks or free kicks or something. I swear every single one of them was clapping or otherwise making noise. It was beautiful. Too bad their enthusiasm wasn't rewarded.
I dunno, a lick in the nuts wouldn't be nearly as pleasant as a lick on them... I think it's still valid, typo or no.
Oh no, what a bad typo. I MEANT kick. Good thing I could go back and edit that. Bill, embarassed Rule number one. Make sure you are awake and caffenated before posting on a Monday morning....... Sorry 'bout that and enjoy the laugh at my expense I guess.
Thanks for the list Hal. I agree totally. Kevin Terry did much the same in the 5th of July game. 4 cards, a PK & sub, and at least one major injury added up to one minute in the first half of that game, 5 or so in the second half. Kennedy called 7 yellows. Olsen down for 1:30, Mathis down, Convey down, Warren kicked in the face, Wolyneic down, and a sub all added up to ONE FREAKING MINUTE. And then 5 at the end for about the same amount of delay. No consistancy in the calls (Leitch no card? Not even for fouling someone on their way in to the goal??). No consistancy in the time awarded. Walker delays and time is blown immediately. Napoleon is an idiot. To be fair, the last foul was called at about 4:40 in stoppage, and the kick taken at about 5:10-15. If it was DC to tie the game there, we all would have wanted Kennedy to let it go. Leitch should have been carded. The supporters sounded great on MSG (although I had to tape it 3 times to get the whole game). Thx, Jay!
F#*k NY/NJ I won't even mention the ref-was it Alex Prus(however you spell the dooouche's name)? Too bad for Ben looked like he would get through an injury free season-Two injuries for the only two to start vevery game this year big losses just need others to step it up a notch. Doug showed me enough in goal to sooth my nerves, just don't start him in the Open Cup on Wed and keep most of the regulars on the bench. Usually I love Mathis since he has done well as a Nat, but his foul cost us the game(stoppage time that would not have happened) in the future MLS needs to institute a rule for end of game fouls by teams that are behind. Why the hell should the ref give extra time for that foul it was to NY's advantage. What's to stop teams down a goal having someone who is without a card commit a hard foul just to win an extra two mins-I now that sounds absurd but it has merit now would not surprise me to see the metroscum try this tactic they stumbled on much the same way they abuse the goalie sub rule. If we beat C-Bus next sat we'll have 40 pts and C-Bus will still be stuck at 31 with both teams down to 3 games-do the math a win on sat and we are in the playoffs finally again. Go DCU!
Not to mention the assistant (Trask?) who was about halfway down to the corner, and kicked the sideboard after the Jolley "throw-in" in overtime.
The ref wasn't bad. What do you expect? What else could he have done? Just about every yellow card was earned. Sure, he could've issued some straight reds instead of yellows, and maybe a few more yellows, but be reasonable. These two teams were out for each other, and no ref was going to stop that. I've seen comments all over the place, and when added up, you expect the impossible. Control the game? Threw too many yellows? Didn't give enough reds? All the ref can do is call what he sees. And this ref saw a lot. I don't think he missed a whole lot. Time management is a league-wide problem, and it would be inconsistent of this ref to all of a sudden start a one-man enforcement of it. In fact, he gave the first yellow for time-wasting that I've seen all season. In my opinion, it wasn't too much time at the end, it was too little time at the half. But big deal. We didn't win because we didn't score (except the PK.) We had a few good chances that ended in terrible shots, and our best shot was by, of all players, Etcheverry, which was barely tipped over the bar. The stupid fouls at the end, and bad give-aways when we were trying to kill the clock are what tied this game for us, not the ref.
Nope, not Eddie Pope - I would take Petke over him any day. He likely makes 1/3 his salary, and is 90% the player Pope is. Pope's game winners not withstanding, I actually think Petke is more dangerous in the air. Pope has national team duty, Petke does not. Pope has the annual 6 to 8 weeks injury, Petke comes back from a broken ankle in what? 3 weeks. Sorry, as much as I loved Eddie in a DC uni, I think Petke is a far better value for the money. . Now you want to give me someone from the Metros, I'll take Guevarra. Yes he is a diving little bitch, but he is a better amid than anyone we have had since 1999. Other than that, you can have their roster.
I can give John a little leeway personally on that because it was in the runof play when things can get heated. And he's down that end of the box all the time anyway. But Hristo was unexcusable. Except for the fact that he's been doing that crap all year. And to think we could have had John Harkes. He's no saint or worldbeater, but I doubt he'd be as divisive or embarassing as Hristo.
We were fortunate to get out of the game with a tie. Face it, when you give up that many free kicks within 30 yards of the box, one will eventually go in. That it happened in the waning seconds, and on one of the less likely chances, is ironic. And painful. But we commited so many fouls in our half of the field, and allowed so many corner kicks, that we can't complain too much. It's a little disturbing, because we have quite a bit more talent than they do. As for taking any Metrostars, I'll take Eddie Gaven any day. And I also like Bartolemeu.
I agree with all your observations. Glad to see someone saw the same game I did. Now that I've cooled off a little, I still haven't changed my view from the sunny side. I think we had ample opportunities to win this one big and our failure to do so rests primarily on the shoulders of the forwards, Earnie in particular. Missing that empty-netter was just inexcusable, and his continued problems staying onside cost us big yet again. Were Curtis to have done the same thing, this board would have been filled with calls for his head. I still don't get the whole "teflon Earnie" thing. When you come from his background I don't think it's altogether unreasonable to expect a little more on a regular basis, particularly given his salary. Thiago continues to look promising, and would love to see him paired with Cerritos in the next match. Maybe Earnie should be groomed for the wing now that Ben is out if you folks really insist on keeping him around. As far as the refs, yes they were bad in general, but the sad fact is that the bar has been lowered to such an extent by the other league idiots we've seen this year that this actually doesn't look all that bad by comparison. I admit I probably didn't give enough credit to Warren with my "not really tested remark," who did have an excellent match - MOM, even. Did anyone else cringe when he went down late in the match? Did we even have another GK suited at that point? And finally, where the hell are our allocations? I thought we had these out the wazoo? And given a choice, I'd still take Pope. Not to dis Pekte, though, who has had a fine season.