DC United Preview - 9/13/2006

DC United vs. New England Revolution
GILLETTE STADIUM, Foxborough, Mass.
7:30 p.m. ET Sept. 13, 2006

DC United travels up to the Razor for their third match of the season against the defending Eastern Conference Champions, the New England Revolution. United won their first encounter 1-0 at RFK and drew with the Revs 1-1 in their last meeting in Foxborough. The Revolution currently sit in 3rd place in the East with 34 points, as United lead the table with 51 points.

DC United are coming off of one of the more inspirational matches of their season. Having four of their starters suspended due to yellow card accumulation, United fielded a side mostly made up of reserve team players. Having to play against one of the three clubs to hand United a defeat this season, the outlook for that match looked pretty dim. Proving damn near everyone wrong, the United line-up, anchored by the reserves cam away with a 1-1 draw and showed signs that they will be able to contribute more to the campaign that some figured. The outlook for the rest of this season has become a whole lot brighter, based on the play of our reseves.

The Revolution are coming into tonight's match winning just two of their last ten matches, a 1-0 victory over the Columbus Crew on 8/27 and a 1-0 victory in their last match over RBNY. With only a 1 point lead over Kansas City for third in the East and a 5 point gap over RBNY, New England needs to start getting more than 1 point from their matches to ensure that they get to the post season. Both of those clubs are idle tonight and they play each other on Saturday, so this would be a great chance to open up a wider gap to lock down the third play-off spot in the East.

Based on the performance on Saturday against RSL and the fact that we have an away match this Sunday at Toyota park against the hottest club in MLS, the Chicago Fire, United Coach Peter Nowak should be looking to maximize the playing time of all United players, and might want to look at using some of those reserves earlier than he usually does in the match. With Alecko missing the trip due to a knee injury, this is a chance for some of the other guys to get more playing time.

As most of the United starters have had a week off from play, I am expecting a good showing from them. Hopefully the combination of Gomez, Adu and Donnet will be able to provide a good creative spark to the club and get the 3 points tonight. I just hope that Jaime doesn't fade away in this match like he did on Saturday.

Prediction: DC United 2 - 0 New England Revolution.