WVHooligan - Soccer Blog

A short week was week 20 in Major League Soccer. Only four games of action and all were won by eastern clubs. Some wins were bigger than others while some clubs continue to stumble.

The biggest story had to be Chicago’s come-from-behind win over New England. The best game of the weekend for sure had a nice crowd of almost 20k in New England. Again that game was probably decided on a red card (more on that in a few).

But with only four games there was obviously more focus on the Olympic team and how they were doing. Tough draw really, felt more like a loss to me. As tough as a result that it was I was still very impress with a few MLSers out there for the US.

Anyways, let’s not focus too much here on the Olympic teams here so let’s figure out what happened this weekend in MLS.

Toronto FC 1 - 0 Colorado Rapids:

• Did anyone get the memo about this game? Just boat loads of empty seats in Dicks Sporting Goods Park. Maybe its all because of the terrible stadium security issues that are going on there. Either way it just looked bad on what looked like a beautiful Colorado evening.
• What a goal by Chad Barrett. Definitely did NOT see that coming out of him. Six goals on the year now for Barrett, another thing we didn’t see coming but I must say I am hoping for more out of him.
• Colorado just couldn’t buy a goal in this one. Loads of chances but all wasted for the most part or Toronto keeper Greg Sutton came up big.
• Speaking of Sutton, nice saves all around in this one. Ten on the night.
• What was with that indirect free kick by Toronto? From six-yards out they should have done better with that. But I suppose professionals don’t practice the indirect freebies too often.
• Terrible foul by Colin Clarke. He gave the ref little reason to not red card him on that check into the ad boards.
• So the Rapids are the first club to 10 losses on the year. Yup, the first. Let’s put this into perspective here, each of the last three years the Rapids had 13 losses in each season. So with 10 right now they are well on their way to increase that number. Can that put the pink slip on Clavijo’s desk any quicker here?
• Give credit to Toronto here though for this win. As much as they shouldn’t have won they over came a lot to get it done on the road for the third time in club history. They still need to make some moves here before the transfer window closes up.
• Speaking of making moves, I wonder if Colorado will wise up and finally sign a striker here. They are top dog on the allocation list so it would make sense to make something happen right?

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Chicago Fire 2 - 1 New England Revolution:

• Nice to see Taylor Twellman start…and score for New England.
• Yet another red card decided this game between these two clubs. We saw it earlier in the season in Chicago when a red card pretty much ended New England’s hopes on the road. The red to Shalrie Joseph (for knocking the ball out of Blanco’s hands) was a game changer in my mind.
• Nice come back by Chicago here. Are they now the best club in the league? I don’t know but if they aren’t they’ve definitely closed the gap between them and the Revs.
• What happened to Matt Reis on that first goal? Great knuckleball by Gonzalo Segeras.
• Was Wilman Conde offside on that second goal? Nope. Had he touched the ball first on the cross then yes but since he didn’t he was able to get back onside and knock it home for his first of the year.
• Aside from the two late goals and the one early goal…and the one red card this was an extremely even game. I just wonder what kind of series this will be in the eastern conference finals later on in the playoffs.
• Just New England’s second loss in two months in all competitions. Wow. Impressive to say the least even with the loss.

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Kansas City Wizards 3 - 2 Chivas USA:

• Pretty much the result I expected out of the Wizards this weekend but what I did not expect was a strong come back by Chivas. They could have easily tied this game up had it not been for Kevin Hartman.
• Some crazy goals by the Wizards though but you know what they say, a goal is a goal. And with the way the Wizards’ offense is going these days a three goal day is a good thing no matter how weird the goals were.
• Give loads of credit to Chivas for fighting back in this one. They were missing Razov, Suarez, Bornstein, Galindo, Eskandarian and Kljestan. That’s a bulk of their roster right there and they still made this one interesting.
• With those two late goals from Chivas, KC is still giving people reasons to doubt their defense. They have to fix some things back there to make a playoff push here.
• Man of the match for me, at least late in the game was Kevin Hartman. He should have had another shutout on Saturday but his defense let him down.
• I still believe if this Chivas club was healthy we would be talking about them near the top of the table. Its amazing what injuries can do to a club in a single year.

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New York Red Bulls 4 - 1 DC United:

• Best result of the season and all-time against DC for the Red Bulls. Honestly did not see this one coming so to those who did congrats.
• Boy did DC lay an egg in this one. Had the early lead with Jamie Moreno’s 120th career MLS goal. At least I got that part right saying he would impact this one.
• As good as Barrett’s goal for Toronto was I think that free kick by Juan Pablo Angel was just a little bit better.
• New York beats DC for just the third time in the last 21 meetings in all competitions. Finally making the Atlantic Cup interesting again.
• Ugly defense by DC here, after a solid game a week ago they came out and pretty much did the opposite in this one. That back pass by Marc Burch  was tough to watch as it lead to Angel’s second.
• Speaking of Angel, if he is fully fit here that can only mean good things for the Red Bulls. Their offense finally looked alive for once and their defense was able to hold for once.
• DC has to find a way to keep their energy up for a full 90 here. I liked the way they started the game but not too long after the Moreno goal it looked as though they took the foot off the pedal. You just can’t do that in a rivalry game.