http://www.mlsnet.com/MLS/news/mls_...25&content_id=17755&vkey=mlscup2004&fext=.jsp Lovely little peice, obviously about the difference between last year's side and this year's side. Any doubt that this is a much stronger, more confident and aggresive team?
Based on the facts? This year we ended up 11-10-9. Last year we ended up 10-11-9. This year we got an unwarranted offsides call (IMO) which helped us win a playoff game. Debatable.
There certainly is confidence. And a will to win, to perservere, none of that play for a tie crap. Confidence in the guys in the team, none of this "McDonald's Football" crap, no looking for "Gazza", confidence. I think part of it has to do w/ the Adu Hoopla, that resigning Moreno came in under the radar. And his blockbuster first game helped build Jaime's confidence, besides the fact that he's back in Black. Eventhough part of me still Believes that if the Metros go up by 4 on Saturday, Adu could provide that wonder hattrick, but besides that we are a better team this year by far, eventhough the record doesn't show so much. Going from 10-11-9 to 11-10-9 may not SEEM like much, In the MLS, with all the friggin parity and the teams morale from last year to this one its a Whole Helluva lot. We smacked the Metros 6-2. Cheatin' Bob was own3d by Piotr this year. Ben Olsen made the switch to the Holding Central Midfield role, and didn't Make One Excuse. Perkins played his ass off, and then got benched w/ no keivetching at all. Josh Gros. What can you say about Josh Gros's first 2 months. This is a better team, overall. Record be damned, As much better as going from BARELY 4th Place to a solid 2nd Place deserves.
The record itself doesn't mean much, other than reminding us to temper our enthusiasm a bit. Records from year to year are affected by a ton of different things. As others pointed out in many other threads, last year we got some extra cheap wins against Dallas, this year, we didn't play any horrible teams (at least while they were horrible). Last year we finished fourth. Barely. We got beat at home in our first playoff game getting manhandled. We had one good stretch during the season. This year we finished second, by beating the team already in second, then beat them handily in their own stadium. We had one bad stretch during the season. I'd say that means we're better, no doubt. MLS Cup Champions better? I'll let you know in 3 weeks.
The team this year resembles the team this time last year in no way whatsoever. Can you imagine one of the veterans (let alone an assistant coach) of this team pushing a younger, smaller, teammate to the ground in anger in an extremely important playoff game? All that ugliness is gone. Even if we lose on Saturday and wash out of the playoffs, I can't imagine feeling worse than I felt last year. Disappointed, yeah. But not bitter or angry.
Bud, God love ya, but if you can't notice a discernable difference between this season and last season, God help you.. It's night and day.. Discipline, structure and organization.. We had none of this from last seasons team.. It was a miracle we got to where we did last season..
My younger son's travel team had a disappointing result Sunday, and there was some biatching and finger pointing on the field after one goal. After the game one of the coaches asked the kids if they watched DC United: "Do you see the players on DC United yelling at each other out on the field?" I couldn't help myself - I said, "Not since they got rid of Stoichkov." The adults all laughed... And let's not forget that the Convey thing finally got settled this year. That had to have been a distraction, plus we got a great player to replace him!
There are several differences from last year. Mainly the last 5 or 6 games of the season last year, Olsen gets hurts, and we never win again. This year, well, you can see a difference in momentum heading into the playoffs. Talk about peaking at the right time. Also, we are playing with more speed and energy, and an overall better organization than we did last year. The records are so close because early this year we weren't getting any goals. But now we are. And we've scored on corners. And won 3 on the road. And we have no major injuries. Is that enough?
You gotta be kidding. Comparing the last year's team with this year's team is comparing night to day. If you can't see that the team is much much better than it was last year, it's not surprising to me that you keep getting the offside call wrong. Oh, and it is "offside" and "onside." "Offsides" applies to football or hockey, not soccer.
Bud, if you can't see it and feel it, how about these facts: 2004 Last ten games of the season 6-2-2 2003 Last ten games of the season 3-4-3 This team is playing much better than last year heading into and during the playoffs. Nothing debatable in these numbers. GO UNITED!!
without a doubt this team is stronger than last years, we play well almost every game and the heart is there!
The last four words in this post hit the nail squarely on the head. THIS IS imho, the SINGLE BIGGEST DIFFERENCE. You cant measure it, its an intangible. Its not something you can readily see, touch, feel or analyze with any statistic. Its more of a phenomenon (spelling?) than anything. It something that when it happens, just IS. No real ryme or reason to it, and its happening right before our eyes. This team has HEART, they have the DESIRE, the WILL and determination. They have the CHEMISTRY, they are playing as one unit, a true TEAM, and that is something you will ALWAYS find with winners and champions of anykind, rich or poor. Sure money helps build championship franshises, but thats only part of the puzzle. That can only go so far, and can almost NEVER make up for a lack of any of the things I just mentioned. Im not sure exactly where I can look back to and pinpoint the change. Myabe it was the 1-0 loss to the screw that we SHOULD have won. Ive said this since the beginning of the season, that this team was loaded with talent, but they just werent playing as a TEAM. They didnt seem to have that chemistry. They didnt seem to just "know" what ecahother was going to do in any given situation, or where thier mates might be on the pitch. ALl that has now seemed to come together, and is firing on all cylinders. D.C. United, over the course of this year has grown into, and become that great team unit I always knew was there, and could do great things. How far will that take them, and us? No one can say right now, but its been one hell of a ride so far, and right now, it feels like were just gettin started.
Technically, I have heard both. Take it from "Madriversoccer": http://www.madriversoccer.org/fallrules.htm OFFSIDES A player is offsides when nearer to their opponent's goal line than the ball, unless: 1. the player is in his/her own half of the filed; or 2. there are two players from the other team between the attacking player and the goal. The penalty for offsides is an indirect free kick. I suggest Mike you let them know, as well as the countless other people that are using the term wrongly ON THE FIELD. Anyways, why are you bringing this up here? Lemme guess...on second thought, you're right Mike. Whatever u say. Hilarious.
Of course there is a discernable difference CWeed. I was just mentioning there is NOT a discrenable difference in the results. So to start w/the self-congratulating and idealizing is a bit premature IMO. Let's win the Cup and THEN let's talk this stuff IMO.
That's true rugman, we've got a better record in this latest stretch. Just remember before this stretch, we picked up Gomez, using Convey's salary. Ray wanted to do the same thing-who knows if he would have been as successful. I'm out for good on this thread. Have fun.
I don't think anyone still does have doubts on the whole coaching issue, but just read between the lines here with the players comments and remember what they're really talking about is Hudson/Stoichkov etc. vs. Nowak and this newer United. Peter might have some to learn about coaching, which can be expected from such a new coach, but one thing he does have down is that this team is a TEAM that does fight for each other and work hard to make each player better.
That's a good point... Quite a few of us wouldnt have minded a good shoving of Bobby to the ground again. I am glad ALL of the EGOs are gone.
There are a lot of valid points here, and Bud nobody here is getting ahead of themselves here. The change has been obivous from the offset and to be quite honest, you can see it in the players since August. They are HUNGRY, they've worked their arses off under Peter's system and its working well. We all want this victory on Saturday, and heck we want to see 2 more wins after that. But the team is in better condition, and yes, the attitudes are gone. Is this the comeback year for DCU? Only time will tell!
And remember that several of us worried about hiring a neophyte coach? I don't think Piotr has put a foot wrong all year. He has installed a successful system which, after getting the players to buy into it, made DCU both successful and entertaining to watch. I think he has done well with the Adu addition - giving him enough playing time for Freddy to learn how much he still had to learn to be successful in this league. The team now believes in its coach, its system, and its players, and that makes all the difference.
Quote: "After winning three out of the first four championships in MLS history, D.C. fell on hard times in the new millennium, missing out on the postseason from 2000 to 2002 before barely scraping into last year's playoffs with a losing record." I'm sorry (and I know I'm preaching to the choir), but I take exception to the highlighted part listed above. I know MLS has it's own system, but DC United didn't fall on hard times. It was systematically gutted over three years. Just a little pet peeve of mine. As far as the difference a year makes, it is VERY obvious to anyone who watched this team play this last season that they are a MUCH better team. The final results may be close, but the level of play is higher this season.
I was not going to bring this up, but every damn time I think of the "hard times" we as DCU supporters have had to endure, I think of this very same thing. I love MLS, but this has been and always will be one of the biggest beefs I have with this league. I understand how 'parity' can be and is a good thing, but I also fully belive that every league needs its flagship club. Every league can benefit from the Man U's , NY Yanks, and Montreal Canadiens. Thank god we pretty much still are that to MLS, and were able to get 3 cups, but I agree that little blurb you highlighted above really struck a sour nerve in me too. However, knowing that as we do, it will make our next championship all that much more sweet.
True, there's not too much difference in the overall record of 2003 and 2004, but the main difference is within the league. Parity is considerably greater than last year, leading to more ties, hence fewer points overall. The removal of overtime also contributed to having more ties. Given our 2003 OT record, this would have resulted in more points for us, but also fewer points for teams that played well in OT (the Metros, for example, had three OT victories) Last year Chicago had the best record overall with 53 points, and Dallas were last with 23. We had 39 points, which put us in 7th place overall, but statistically the middle (14 points from the top, 16 points from the bottom) This year Columbus had the best record overall with 49 points, and Chicago and NE tied for the worst record with 33 points. We had 42, good for fifth overall, but, like last year, statistically in the middle (7 points in from the top, 9 points from the bottom). But the difference between the first and last place team between 2003 and 2004 was cut in half, which means that points were much harder to come by. In this light, any improvement over last year's record has to be seen as a major turnaround. For two years we had some severe issues with our offense. In 2003 alone we were shutout 10 times, and only two teams scored fewer goals than us. This year, only the Metros scored more goals than us (47-43), and eight of theirs came from PKs, whereas we had one. For the first time in years, we have a feared offense again. Granted, 25% of our goals came against one team, but what are the Metros for anyway, if not to be our bitches? We finally ended the corner drought, and even scored another one a couple of weeks ago. As a game winner. Against the Metros. Our defense wasn't as strong, letting in six more goals than last year. But the 5-1 debacle against Dallas had more to do with our injury situation than poor coaching or execution, and throw on top of that the Rimando-Perkins situation. Last year our mid-season acquisitions were Cerritos and Thiago, neither of whom considerably improved the team. This year, they were Gomez, Thompson, Ezra and Kuffour. Only Gomez has made a contribution, but it's a sizeable contribution. Hendrickson came up big in the Swamp, and also gave us depth in the back so that we didn't have to use Stokes anymore, so maybe he also made a contribution, too. There is no doubt we are a better team this year.
The telling difference for the statistically inclined this season has been our record in the playoffs. So far we have one more win and two more goals than last year at this time. I call that progress. I was told that there would be no math. ...and not to get into it with Bud about an off-topic issue, but: I'm sure the Mad River Valley Soccer Association is a reputable organization, but I tend to fall back on FIFA whenever a question about the laws of the game comes up: Here is a description of the offside rule for you. Note that there is only one Law 11, if there were two I suppose we could could call them the "Offsides" Laws. Hilarious.