OFFICIAL DC vs KC Post-match thread [R]

Another key, and probably the most important one at the moment is that United isn't getting any leads in matches. The reason why United went on that unbeaten string last season was they scored early and stayed on top for the most part.

So far this season United has fallen behind by two goals inside of 30 minutes in both matches and have been chasing the game from then on (even worse tonight by falling behind inside of 8 minutes). I doubt any team in MLS, much less one favored to do well, can win under those conditions.

This more than anything else has to be sorted out immediately.

It's just defies belief at the moment that United can go toe-to-toe with Chivas and then turn around and lay these two turds back to back.

Brian Carroll, what the f**k has happened to you? Soehn sent a message by yanking Erpen at the half, will he do the same for Carroll?

 

"In the third minute, Johnson flicked the ball down the left side to rookie Michael Harrington, who beat Facundo Erpen, bore down on goalkeeper Troy Perkins and waited until he was comfortable with the angle before slotting an eight-yarder to the far corner."

Maybe the pressbox view is different, but the TV view showed the shot go thru Perkin's legs at the near post.....

 

Good points. As for Carroll though, he should have been yanked from the starting lineup 2 games ago, when we played Chivas in Mexico. It just doesn't seem like he can be bothered at the moment. And again, I go back to Gomez. He looks like a shell of the player we saw last year. He looks to be in great shape, so what's the deal? I'm very troubled with the possibility that the contract situation has led him to give less than his best.

 

bad luck fellas

 

It was another bad match for Brian.

People are commenting on how Onalfo said their strategy was to attack Erpen; but it seemed to me at times like their strategy was to attack Carroll. There were several times where Carroll received a backpass near midfield, and instantaneously it was as if a whistle had blown at a track meet -- boom, their wings, a central mid, and the two forwards who are nearer our goal (and thus behind Carroll) are running at Carroll at full sprint. Five players closing on him as fast as they can sprint. So he dumps the ball in a hurry, it doesn't go anywhere useful, and that's the end of our possession.

Erpen and Carroll both were horrid in this match. I wish it weren't true. McTavish wasn't great, but he did better than Erpen.

Something I'm confused about: don't they use different cleats for different conditions? Did we have the wrong damned cleats on, in the first half anyway? We slipped and slid all over the place; them, not a third as often.

God I hope not.

In the car leaving the stadium, EdTheRed and I were both commenting on the 2000 season vibes we were getting; interesting to see other people saying that here.

One other comment: our starting defense hasn't changed from last season -- same three players -- so maybe it just took other teams a long while to figure it out. But right now, our defense seems too slow to play in this league. High school soccer -- just hopefully booting the ball up the field and hoping your player runs to it before the defense does -- actually works against us. Our defense isn't as fast as the attack of either Colorado or KC. And guess what: I've seen enough of every other team in the league to know that they're not as fast as any other team's offense either.

We'll win sooner or later; but this looks like a very, very long season ahead.

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/14/AR2007041401754.html

Thank God one of them said it.

I hope more of the players take this attitude. Thank God we have a bye week at this point because we desperately need the time to figure out what the hell kind of team we're going to be this season.

 

The other alarming thing about last night's game is that part of last year's gaudy record was built by piling up wins against KC and Columbus. DC's record against the rest of the league certainly wasn't so dominant. It's not a good sign to get manhandled by a team that United owned last year, especially by one that basically returned the same team from last season.

 

I gotta say on Harrington's goal: If that had been Moreno coming around the corner like that, he would have passed back into the center for an easy clearance.

Props to Harrington for taking that shot 3 minutes into his MLS career.

 

Everyone keeps claiming the reason Harrington got by for the first goal is because Erpen slipped. Yeah he slipped, AFTER Harrington already blew by him. Kinda like the keeper that makes the terrific dive for the ball AFTER it hits the back of the net.
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Erpen got smoked like a fat bone on that play. Not sure if Harrington is that fast or if Erpen underestimated his pace. Regardless, this was just one of what continues to be multiple poor decisions by Erpen each game. He clearly has the athletic ability and skillset to be one of the leagues best defenders. His brain is currently about U11 level. Is this fixable?? A match or two off wouldn't be the worst thing for him...

 

Fred is good. Olsen tried hard. Erpen and Jaime SUCKED. GAM undressed and destroyed every defender we had on the field multiple times. Could be good news for the US.

 

Not wanting to whine (much) or anything, but who's on Utd's team this year? I mean, when last I paid close attention, Utd was dropping players like flies. Now the new season starts and the team looks exactly like last year's team minus all the players they got rid of with the addition of exactly 2 (!) new players.

Somewhere is there a list of all the players we acquired in the offseason to make up for those we got rid of? 'Cause I get the unsettling feeling that maybe Utd has stood pat while the rest of the league moved on.

Whine. Moan. <repeat>

 

Well I hope he makes it to Oz and back by the next game.

 

KC fan here, no trolling involved.

I thought DC did very well to get back to 2-2. KC has been notorious for blowing leads the last couple of years, and your boys took advantage of that.

I think most of us, fans from both sides, were surprised at the Wizards performance. I'm not taking too much stock in it yet, and neither should the rest of the league. People will talk about NE and KC all week, but it's a long season. DC is going to right up there, and any KC fan who doesn't realize that the path to the playoffs goes through RFK didn't take off their blue colored sunglasses before they passed out drunk last night. It's a long haul.

Your crowd was amazing. It can't be said enough. My girlfriend, she knows nothing about soccer or the background of MLS fans at all, said at one point "damn, those guys are loud there." And you were.

Perkins is disappointing me as well (proud MFLS owner here). In both games I expected much more from him. Giving up the first goal was tough because Harrington was darn close. But you still can't give up the near post or 5-hole. If he's going to beat you, get beat far post. Come at him legs together, arms down at your sides and he'll shoot far post. A rookie might even miss far post in that position. But Harrington just closed his eyes and pulled the trigger. An experience keeper like Perkins should realize this and get in a better body position to stop the near post shot.

 

Could it have been that we were pushing alot of players forward and they were just countering

 

Also considering DCU was averse to attacking down his side in the first half, it's really hard to say what kind of half he had. He was more visible in the 2nd half and saw more of the ball, as a defender. I thought he played well over all. HE has much better speed than Erpen. I know many people consider him a midfielder based on where he played last season, but remember he played his entire senior season at WVU as a sweeper. He's a pretty versatile player, I know when I coached his as a youth player he could play, and I played him, pretty much everywhere except in goal. He's got a good "soccer brain" and is a good over all athlete. He had that great slide tackle towards the end of the first half that Erpen turned over that lead to KC's 3rd goal.

 

The rain outside isn't helping my mood.

 

I started getting that feeling too, hopefully we are the West Ham of MLS this season. It just seems like all the bounces are going against us so far, I wouldn't be surprised if Perkins got beat by a header from half field next game...shudders at the memories. We gotta get that win soon cuz this could snowball outta control real quick and we'll find ourselves in a hole real early in the season.

 

with all of this talk about changing formations, has anyone considered the most frequent one used at the SE pick up games? The infamous 4-0-6 seems to work out there. . .

 

well everyone knows that I bashed Erpen in the past. At this point its not even about that anymore. Its about how we are playing. Perkins lets in a softy at the CHivas game and boom, there we go down the hill. I think we need to play in flat back 4 with real defenders. We better get some guys soon, heck I know a guy who could play for DC.

 

Maybe Chivas sucks a lot worse than we think.

Actually, the Jumbotron view at RFK showed it pretty clearly too.

 

I just watched the game again this morning and KC did do much to deserve such a big victory, unless you consider being opportunistic, planed. They did well on scoring on our slips and terrible give aways. If we let teams score so early on us we commit more men forward and teams just have to clog the middle and sit back for counters. Other then Namoff we have a slow back line.

My Sunday just isn't the same after such a disappointing game. I'm also catching a cold, can we get a game that's not in the rain and freezing the last 3 have been terrible.

 

A few comments overall. Erpen needs to stop trying to hit that crossfield ball to the left outside midfielder. Everytime he hit it it was intercepted. I know it's a tempting ball to hit, it doesn't look that far and the player is open, but that ball is travelling 40 yards vertically and about 50-60 horizontally, not many people in the league, let alone the world can hit that ball once a game let alone the 5-7 times he tried. Add to that the bad conditions and he didn't have a change in hell to complete that pass, just really bad decision making on his part, which seems to be par for the course for the team right now.

An example of the really bad defending/decision making. On the second goal, it was a bad give away inside our half and I think it was Johnson who was coming down the left part of the field, Namoff who is all the way over on the other side of the field calls off a DC player who is closest to the KC player with the ball to sprint all the way across the field which leaves the player he was marking wide open who collects the ball and scores. Namoff should have never made that run. It was terrible decision. There was already a DC olayer closer to the man with the ball. Why Namoff felt he had to make that play and basically switch positions with the guy closest to the ball, I will never know. Looked very high schoolish to me.

For once we tried to get the ball out to the flanks, unfortunately we only used one side of the field to do this. By midway in the first half the KC defender was pinching in and leaving McTavish wide open because we pretty much refused to play down that side of the field. BY limiting ourselves this way we made it much easier for KC to defend us.

Lastly, in the great tradition of DC teams of the past we pretty much refuse to shoot from outside the box when the opportunity presents itself. We constantly look for that extra pass into a congested penalty box where the attack inevitably fails.

 

anyone catch fenty's comments before the game (didn't make it in from the tailgate in time). was there a jersey with a 10 on the back?