My Take: DC United 2 - 1 Pachuca

I hate it when I get the score right.

I have mixed feelings about what happened last night at RFK. On the one side, United did win the match, finally fighting back to score two late goals and win their third straight home match of the short season. Was that more to do with the fact that Pachuca did what they needed to do, and were sitting back? I am not certain.

What I am certain of is that the better club did win the series. Last night I saw a very discomposed DC United out on the field. I saw several passes that were made blindly and to no one. I saw many miscues when trying to play together, too many for a club that has been together for two and a half months. Pachuca on the other hand had the type of "feeling" for each other that they were able to quickly break out with quick passes, accurate passes, and cause havoc for the United backline. However, the backline did very well, as they have in every other match this short season, which once again gives me hope for the future.

Do we blame the miscues and errant cohesiveness on the fact that United have only been together for about two and a half months? Do we blame the fact that almost half of the starters last night were new players to the club? Again, I am not certain.

Considering that once again we had both MLS clubs knocked out of the CONCACAF Champions Cup, I say that right now, both of those clubs should simply chalk the tournament up as an intense early season primer. Who should be worried about the fact that MLS clubs have again failed to reach the mountain top is Garber & Co.

Yes, the CONCACAF Champions Cup is finished after Pachuca and Saprissa face off in their home & away series, but next season MLS clubs will have to face pretty much the same situation with the Quarter Finals of the CONCACAF Champions League. According to Steve Goff at the Washington Post, the 2009 part of the Champions League schedule is identical to the current Champions Cup schedule -

Feb. 24-26, 2009: Quarterfinal, Game 1
March 3-5: Quarterfinal, Game 2
March 17-19: Semifinal, Game 1
April 7-9: Semifinal, Game 2
April 21-23: Final, Game 1
April 28-30: Final, Game 2

If the league (MLS or SUM, whoever really runs things) wants MLS clubs to compete and win this tournament, they are going to have to figure out something new for the clubs. Maybe a real increase in the salary cap to actually attract better players to fill out the 28 man roster, which would give MLS clubs more than the "real" 16 players that they truly have.

Maybe they need to provide the CONCACAF clubs with more and meaningful winter training, and earlier in the calendar year. Bundesliga clubs have January off, yet they still schedule warm up matches to prepare for the second part of their season, why not have MLS clubs travel to Germany to train and face off against two or three Bundesliga sides? Get the players more than just stretching and running drills before they hit the first Quarter Final match, assuming that they reach the Quarter Finals.

So United is out of CONCACAF play until the SuperLiga (July) and the CONCACAF Champions League (September). I say that United should take the positives from last night and the supposed better match fitness to Salt Lake and kick the hell out of Real on Saturday night. Take the good from the bad and take the points from the league.

Match-Prep: DC United vs. Pachuca 4/9/2008

It's return leg time at RFK Stadium for DC United. United hosts Mexican super-club Pachuca in the second leg of the CONCACAF Champions Cup Semi-Finals tonight. Pachuca took advantage of the higher altitude and a less than sharp United squad and grabbed a 2-0 win in the first leg last week.

A 2 goal hole isn't the worst of situations to be in. We are at home and we seemed to have found a much better shape for the side with Santino starting up front with Emillio, in front of Gallardo. It would be interesting to see Moreno start up front with Emillio and have Gallardo, Fred, Quaranta and Simms in the midfield. I think that Santino would be a bit of a better option on the right flank, passing wise and shooting wise.

United coach Tom Soehn summed it up the best when he said, "You don't have to win the game in 15 minutes; you do it over a course of 90 minutes, you have to be patient and we will get our chances."

In the match against Toronto last Saturday, United was very fortunate to have a 2-0 lead by the 6th minute mark... I will be happy with a 1-0 lead by the 15th minute. I am hoping that being at home, back down to earth and fresh off of a very good victory, United is able to retain it's shape and get the goals it needs. Most important thing is that United needs to be patient and play it's game. If United let's Pachuca dictate the pace and the style of play, it will be over.

Unfortunately, I really don't see us winning 3-0, which we need to. A 2-1 win tonight seems more likely.

My Take: DC United 0 - 2 Pachuca

I honestly have a lost for words. I expected better. Yes, I know that this is the fourth match of the year and that we were playing on the Moon when you consider the altitude. I don't give a damn. I expected better play.

The thing that bugs me is that I saw better play at times, but I saw some really stupid play at others, and I saw some other things in between. As this young season moves forward, I am getting more and more questions forming in my head about our squad than I am answers.

Zach Wells really did not need to get that Yellow Card. So early in the match, it was plain stupid for him to have constantly held the ball for as long as he did on his goal kicks. Regardless of the altitude, these guys have been training for the better part of 6 weeks, even up in the thin air; they should have been able to get through the first 30 minutes without him holding the ball that long. It was a stupid mental lapse that was in truth, a foreshadowing of other mental farts that the rest of the team would do. One of those was Wells' failure to protect his near post on the first goal.

Paging Mr. MLS MVP!!!! Can someone please find Mr. Emillio? He was thought to have been sighted at RFK a few weeks ago, but it appears that a lazier form of the MVP has taken the #11 shirt. Emillio, WTF?! You shouldn't be playing that deep man! You are a goal scorer, a goal poacher. You sit up high and wait for the service. You don't come back to collect the ball near midfield and "try" (which is stretching the word, as his moves are just a slight step over mine) and juke and jive your way towards goal.

I think I am starting to understand how Gallardo plays and what he tries to do. Unfortunately, I am starting to think that the rest of the team doesn't have a clue how he wants to play the ball. As was mentioned during the match, Gallardo looks to really need someone to play close to him, which might force Soehn to revert back to a 3-5-2 in order to give better play support for Gallardo. He might be a great player, but every time I see one of his passes not get to the intended man, I want Gomez to run on the pitch.

I like Franco Niell, but I would really like to see Santino start the next game. Santino has a better passing ability and if Emillio would play in his proper position, Santino would be able to float in between Gallardo and Emillio to provide a passing option to both of them.

Fred looked much better tonight on the wing, and in all honesty, I wouldn't mind seeing him move into the middle with Gallardo, but I am not so certain how that would work.

So we are in a 2-0 hole, with what could be considered our third international match of the short year, against Toronto FC this Saturday at RFK. If Jamie Moreno doesn't start on Saturday, I would like to see Santino and Emillio up front, with Simms (who again was huge in the midfield tonight) Gallardo, McTavish, & Fred in the midfield. Namoff, Peralta, Burch and Martinez starting in front of Wells. That would give us at least three guys who have some sense of a creative attack (Gallardo, Fred & Santino) to match with Emillio in the offensive third. Bring Jamie on in the second half for holding play and Niell for speed up top.

So much for being at a lose for words. See you all at RFK on Saturday.

My Take: DC United 5 - 0 Harbour View FC

Sitting on the quiet side of RFK tonight, I really wasn't expecting too much. We were five days removed from a very poor performance in Jamaica, one the exposed our fitness levels all too well in the later minutes of the match, which allowed the in form club score and get back into the match up. Five days later, I really didn't see how a nicer field and a colder night would cause any type of drastic turn around.

Happily, I was wrong. I guess someone forgot to tell me that Tom Soehn found one of Superman's capes and decided to hand it over to Devon McTavish, who is currently leading the club in scoring. Leaving RFK, after watching a much better over all performance makes my mind a little more settled, but I still have some questions.

I liked to form of our defense, much more than I did last week. Peralta, Martinez, Burch and Namoff all looked much more comfortable and composed in front of Zach Wells. Burch didn't have the troubles with holding the ball too long and didn't get into any of the troubles that he had last week. assuming that the collective defense continue to improve with their overall collectiveness, we should have a much better defensive shape this year.

Clyde Simms had one helluva match, improving on his good performance from last week. Simms was very timely in his passes and his positioning, which allowed him to break up attacks and to cover for a lot of missed passes.

McTavish... what is there to say? He goes an entire season without a goal and now has three in two matches? His flank play, in my opinion, still needs some work as he missed several opportunities to make runs, a few that directly lead to turnovers, but over all, his work with Burch improved over last week.

Fred looks like he is still trying to break off the rust from the off season. He made a fine pass that released Emillio for the second goal and finished off the match with the final goal, but there were several situations in the first half where I felt he needed to look up and find a teammate more often and other times he needed to be more ruthless. He showed these signs last season, but snapped out of it, I hope he does so earlier this season.

Gallardo, I have to wait on him. I need to see more, because I really have a bad taste in my mouth with him right now. I guess it is because the guy wearing his jersey last year plays the game very differently and I was used to that. On the other side of that, I really haven't seen anything from him in two matches that makes me understand really why he is the DP. I watched him tonight and I really thought that Christian Gomez could have done better. Hopefully I am wrong and in a month's time I am singing his praises. Until then, I really don't know.

Emillio had a brace and several other chances tonight, but nothing really made me think he is ready for the season. Hopefully the next week allows him to work out the kinks and gives him the chance to turn it on against Kansas City. All in all, he did was he was brought in here to do, score goals.

Neill was a work horse up front, causing all types of trouble for the Harbour View defense. His work rate is without question, his left foot on the other hand, I question. He had several chances in both sides of halftime to take a shot on goal, each time it seemed that he took an extra second or touch to move the ball to his right foot and each time he missed the goal or completely launched one into the gravel pit behind the north goal. I like his speed and effort, but I want to see him get some use out of his left foot.

The man of the match, in my opinion, was Santino Quaranta. Yes, the very guy who tarnished his image by scoring on United two years ago, then ran over to Barra and grabbed his crotch as he smugly smiled, has come back to the good side. Tino was brought on right after Emillio made it 2-0 and immediately made an impact. He essentially setup the next three goals, being the spark that sent the United offense into high gear. I asked last week to see him used and I got my wish. Hopefully the guy just played himself into a larger role on the team.

A 6-1 aggregate score line is great and I will take it any day of the week. However, the two matches were closer than the score line shows. Harbour View could have easily shown up tonight with a 3-1 goal lead, which would have never allowed United to play the slow control game that they played in the first half. On the flip side of things, Harbour View, in my opinion, really abandoned ship right after the second Emillio goal, and never really put anything together offensively or defensively after that. So 6-1 is great, but this is only a foundation to build on for the Kansas City road match and the CONCACAF Champions Cup Semi-Finals.

This was a great introduction to the 2008 home season, hopefully we will see more matches like this one this year, rather than the one we saw last week on the TV.

Match Recap: DC United 1 - 1 Harbour View FC

DC United, after a major overhaul during the offseason, began their 2008 campaign with a very lackluster 1-1 draw away to Jamaican champions, Harbour View FC.

Starting four new players from last season's squad, United never really looked that great. The central defense looked respectable as did Namoff. Marc Burch, with the exception of his goal, never really settled down and failed to show the skills that he showed last season.*

The forwards, Emillio, Moreno (for the 20 or so minutes he was on the field), Neill never really got any service from the midfield. To be honest, had they received any service, they probably wouldn't have done any better than what they did when they got the ball. Emillio fell out of the match for 85 minutes, but when he took a shot, he never had anything on them.

It is very unlucky that Moreno went out with a hamstring injury so early into the match. As mentioned so many times last season, the entire United make up changes when Moreno enters or leaves a match. Without Jamie, everything had to go through Gallardo, which meant all Harbour View had to do was hack Gallardo and that would halt the offense.

Zack Wells looked very good tonight. His command and control of the goal box and the penalty box was very good and his control in the air looked strong. he was hung out to dry on the Harbour View goal, as whomever was assigned the back post, failed to show up for duty. That was one of a number of mental mistakes that I expect to not see repeated. Hopefully the mental misteps were more to do with the fitness levels than straight focus.

I have to hope that the overall performance tonight was more due to the lack of fitness than anything else. United were completely gassed by the 70th minute. We had no way of keeping up with the Harbour View players, which was the direct reason of how Harbour View was able to pressure and get the equalizer.

So I guess that the big question is how can United regain some strength in five days? Last season, United traveled to Honduras and looked very, very good in a 4-1 romp over CD Olimpia. United last year, looked like the club that was in midseason, rather than the club starting a campaign. Tonight, United looked worse than a club starting a campaign, they looked like a club who was two weeks in training.

Next week at RFK, I would really like to see guys like Quavas Kirk and Santino Quaranta with some time. I feel that if either one of them had been brought on around the 75th minute, we might have seen more spring in the teams step. Losing Jamie really put United on a back foot too early for this to happen though.

This was one game, so we have to wait and see. Last season started with a bang, and ended with a whimper... if we start with a snooze, do we finish with a trophy? We wait and see.

* EDIT - WTF was I typing last night????? McTavish scored the goal, not Burch. This makes me even less happy with Burch than I was last night. Damn, I shoulda had some coffee before i wrote last night.

DC United get Harbour View in CONCACAF

CONCACAF held their final draw yesterday for the CONCACAF Champions Cup (CCC), as the 2008 tournament is to be the final running of that regional club championship. CONCACAF will be rolling out their CONCACAF Champions League sometime around August of 2008, which will replace the CCC. In any case, DC United found out that they will be facing Harbour View of Jamaica in the first round of the CCC, with a potential match up with Mexican powerhouse Pachuca looming for the Semi-Finals of the tournament.

So how do I think DC United will do in this tournament? Honestly, I have no idea. I don't know because it seems as if we are in for a major roster restructuring that really has yet to take shape as of today. Yes, we have already lost a starting defender and are on the verge of losing our starting goalkeeper, but according to other sources, there should be some rather large changes in the club that will happen next month for sure. As we don't even know who will be in our starting 11, or really even have a good idea, I don't know how we will do in the tournament. I don't think we will do any worse than the Semi-Finals, but who really knows.

After looking at the brackets, I do have to say that I believe that Houston has a very, very good shot at reaching the finals this time. Their main opposition looks to be Deportivo Saprissa from Costa Rica, who they can potentially face in the Semi-Finals. I fully expect to see Saprissa knock off Atlante FC in the Quarter-Finals.

So we now know that DC United kicks off its 2008 season in Jamaica around the 11th-13th of March, which I can honestly say, isn't a bad place to start a soccer season. We will be at "home" for the second leg the week of the 18th-20th of March, which should either take place at RFK or at the Maryland Soccerplex. I guess I should start putting money away now for a ticket for the home leg of the first round series.

CONCACAF Champions League

As first reported by Steve Goff, CONCACAF will be scraping the Champions Cup after the 2008 tournament in favor of a "UEFA style" Champions League. It will run from Summer of 2008 to the spring of 2009 and MLS will have four clubs taking part: DC United, Houston Dynamo, New England Revolution & CD Chivas USA. The Revolution & Chivas USA will have to play in the preliminary round to gain entry into the group stage, were as DC United & Houston have already qualified for the group stage. This tournament sounds like something I thought of a time ago, I hope that it works out.

Before we get to the Champions league, we have the final rendition of the Champions Cup to deal with. As of this last Sunday, two final spots in the eight club tournament are up for grabs, which go to the 2007 Mexican League Torneo de Apertura champion & the third place club from the Torneo Interclubes de UNCAF 2007. The current qualifiers are:

- DC United (MLS Supporters Shield Winners)
- Houston Dynamo (MLS Cup Champions)
- Pachuca CF (2007 Mexican League Torneo de Clausura champion)
- Harbour View FC (CFU Champion)
- Deportivo Saprissa (UNCAF)
- CD Motagua (UNCAF)

LD Alajuelense will face CSD Municipal in a third-place series in the Torneo Interclubes de UNCAF 2007 to determine the third UNCAF club to advance to the CONCACAF Champions Cup.

The 2007 Mexican League Torneo de Apertura champion will be determined in December as the Mexican League playoffs are only entering the Quarter Final stages.