Embarassment

It seems like everyone in the stadium knew that this was a must-win game for DC United, except for anybody wearing black. What ever happened to being "hard to play against"? Wasn't that always Soehn's philosophy? This team was fairly easy to play against last night, making bad passes all over the field, including one that probably cost us all hopes of continuing our season. Over 28,000 fans showed up to give this match a playoff atmosphere, and our team let them down.


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1. If every player on the team gave as much effort as Santino Quaranta then we may have stood a chance.


1. Possibly the worst mistake in the history of this franchise was Louis Crayton's inability to clear Peralta's passback. I guess we all knew that he would flub one of those eventually, but it had to be in THIS match?!

2. This is pretty much a rehash of what I said about him last week... But when you're at the end of the line in an absolute MUST-WIN game, Tom Soehn needs to put his best most proven lineup on the field. This was the WRONG time to experiment again with the 3-5-2. We finally had all 5 of our top defenders healthy, and he chooses to only start 3 of them? Gonzalo Peralta hasn't played a meaningful game SINCE JUNE and Soehn chooses to start him as our ONLY central defender? Yes, I'm bitter. And with the decisions he's made the past few weeks, Soehn is receiving a vote of no confidence from me.

3. We suffered from an inability to hold the ball, and frequently had way too much trouble advancing the ball out of the back. For that I blame Marcelo Gallardo, Clyde Simms, and Joe Vide. We had 5 midfielders to their 4 and STILL lost the battle in the midfield.

4. Some pretty poor and lazy defending throughout this match from Gonzalo Peralta and Bryan Namoff.

If the team is looking for a reason to keep fighting, then they need to look no further than the group of fans that stayed to the very end of this match, cheering and singing. In any other sport, you would have been hearing BOOs after the third goal, but not from United supporters! If those fans won't give up, then the team can't either. And the most ridiculous thing about it all is that we still actually have a chance! Even while blog commenters all over the land are calling for Soehn to be fired and for a complete roster overhaul (yeah, because that worked soooo well for this year), United still sits just 2 points out of fourth place in the East, and 1 point out of fourth place in the West. DC wasted this chance to get back into the playoffs with a home game against the weakest opponent left on the schedule. So with games against Houston, New England, and Columbus coming up, our chances are very slim. If we play the way we played last night, then our season is over, and so is Tom Soehn's career in DC. But if these players and this coaching staff somehow find a way to wipe the last month from their memory and embrace their underdog position after everyone else has written them off, they might just do something special.

Award 1: The Richie

By definition, the Richie Award goes to the hardest working, most underrated player on the United roster. The award's namesake Richie Williams is probably most famous for his diminutive stature, but he is second most famous for his work rate. The dude just went nonstop, constantly interrupting plays for the opposing team. And yet he received much less recognition for his role in those three championships than many other players on those teams (Harkes, Agoos, Pope, Diablo, Stewart, etc).

By virtue of playing the same central defensive midfield position as Williams, Clyde Simms would probably be the favorite to win this award. He's made every start this season, and has played a critical role with the team since beating out Brian Carroll for the CDM job last year. Simms has even developed a little bit of a scoring touch this season with two goals. Nonetheless, he's still virtually unknown in the national press when compared to players like Joseph, Mastroeni, and Clark.

Challenging Simms would be our Ironman Bryan Namoff. He's played almost every minute of every match this year, and has been definitely our most consistent defender, if not also our most talented. If you're looking for proof that Namoff is underrated, look no further than the fact that he's had only 1 cap for the national team, while Marvel Wynne continues to get called up.

Also throwing his name into the race this year is Devon McTavish. This Champions Cup scoring machine has probably made more appearances in all competitions combined than any other player this year. And you can't question his work ethic when you realize that he's started in at least 3 different positions this season.

And rounding out the Richie Award nominees is a newcomer to the club Joe Vide. Since joining United in July, he's fought his way into the starting lineup and leaves it all on the field every match, even eliciting comparisons from some to Ben Olsen. Obviously the guy is underrated too when he's been cut by two lesser teams like the Red Bulls and Quakes in the last year.

poll by twiigs.com

(the 2008 Benny awards)

When did the Red Bulls get good?

Who ever said that 0-0 matches aren't exciting? That had to be the most competitive match between these two clubs in a couple years. Usually we dominate these matches, and the last one against the Red Bulls should be thrown out, but I can't think of a time we've ever played them to a scoreless draw. But I was pretty surprised by the score, even after Moreno's uncharacteristic penalty kick miss in the 80th, I still felt that this game was not going to end scoreless. Especially with Gallardo on the field.


1. That was probably the best game in a United uniform for Joe Vide. He is all effort, all the time. And was one of our best attacking options for most of the match.

2. Even when switching to the middle, Bryan Namoff was our best defender in yet another shutout. I'm starting to like him in the middle. As our veteran defender, he should be the one to step up and be the leader in the back, and this is the first season that I'm starting to see that from him.

3. Another good performance by Marc Burch. I think most of us were more scared of Dane Richards than anyone else going in, but Burch kept him at bay for the entire first half.


1. That would be Louis Crayton's third shutout in four matches, but this one gets credited more to the back line than the keeper. Crayton's positioning was excellent and he made 2 key saves, but he was beaten once by Angel on a shot that went just inches wide from a tough angle, and he is likely to give someone in RFK a heart attack by the end of the year the way he dribbles out of the box.

2. Santino Quaranta looked dangerous last night, and controlled the ball well. As our only real attacking midfielder for most of the match though, I'd like to see him distribute more instead of taking sometimes unnecessarily long shots. But I did like how he immediately seemed to take a more defensive approach as soon as Gallardo came on.


1. Clearly he's not fit enough to play 90 minutes, or even 45, but I didn't see enough effort out of Francis Doe in this match. Just before Doe came out, there was one cross from Vide to him in the middle that I'm fairly sure Emilio would have scored on.

2. Not that he played poorly per se, but Ivan Guerrero was not a factor in this match.

Where does this leave us going into the Open Cup final on Wednesday? We might have lost Emilio, but it looks like we've got back Gallardo. If he shows up motivated, Marcelo Gallardo should be able to run all over a USL side. My only worry is who he will pass to without Looch. Let's all keep our fingers crossed that Emilio will be able to give it a go for at least a half. But regardless of who our attackers are, after the last 4 matches, I'm starting to get pretty confident in our defense. This could be another low scoring match, but with Crayton and Namoff around, I'm feeling pretty good about our chances.

Benny Vide delivers the victory

With his one-time shoe-string shot to give the team a 1-0 lead, I could have sworn I was watching Benny Olsen. Or maybe Benny Feilhaber. But definitely somebody named Benny. Nope, it was Joe Vide. That goal really made me wish I was listening to Dave Johnson and Thomas Rongen do the broadcast. I could just hear Rongen saying his usual "Shoelaces... Thanks for coming..." line.

Anyway, up until around the 80th minute, this felt like it was going to be a very underwhelming victory. We looked noticeably mediocre, playing against a middling Western Conference team whose coach had just resigned. DC dominated possession for the most part, but could only generate one goal, and that one was off of a rather spectacular atypical shot. We rightfully pulled away at the end, but it wasn't quite the victory I was hoping for. Once again, it was Gallardo's presence that was missing.


1. Obviously it was the goal by Joe Vide that allowed us to knock the ball around more in the second half. The other two goals would have been much harder to come by if it wasn't for Vide's.

2. Our two stalwarts Brian Namoff and Clyde Simms had their usual awesome performances. I'm thinking that the final 5 minutes after Simms was subbed out was actually the first time all season that either of these guys have come off the field.

3. Playing once again in a CAM role, Santino Quaranta's goal was a beaut. Not often in the MLS do you see someone score from the top corner of the box like that.

4. I'm not likely to take back everything bad I've said about him quite yet, but it was cool to see Quavas Kirk score his first MLS goal in his first minute on the field.


1. How about our new assist machine Luciano Emilio? I don't think we're going to be comparing Looch to John Stockton anytime soon, but I liked seeing him share the wealth with his teammates.


1. It's hard for me to put a defender down here after a clean sheet match, but I was once again a bit disappointed with Gonzalo Martinez. His passes are sometimes too lazy and his dribbling is sometimes too wild. If we ever have Peralta, Burch, and McTavish available all at once, I don't think Martinez should be an automatic starter anymore.

So it wasn't quite a domination as the score suggests, but it was a victory nonetheless. Now let's see if, for the first time in a while, DC can string together multiple wins. They've got the potential to do it, with matches coming up against New York at home and San Jose on the road, with the Open Cup final against Charleston mixed in. Hopefully the team can build on this game and gain some confidence, because I'm not sure the kind of lackluster first half that we had will be enough against an energized USL opponent.

The matches I missed

For the record, here are my player ratings from the two matches I missed while on vacation, based only on descriptions of the games given by Fullback, BDR, and Goff.

8/10/08: 4-1 loss at NYRB
Top shelf: Jaime Moreno
Call: Fred
Rail: Zach Wells, Pat Carroll, Marc Burch, Devon McTavish

8/12/08: 3-1 win in USOC Semi-finals vs NE:
Top shelf: Jaime Moreno, Luciano Emilio, Santino Quaranta
Call: Brian Namoff, Zach Wells, Ivan Guerrero
Rail: None

The other big thing that I missed while I was out was the formal acquisition of new starting goalkeeper Louis Crayton, and the other transactions surrounding that move. As we've all seen so far, if nothing else, Crayton is certainly more confident and more decisive than Wells has ever been. From what I can gather, he also seems to be quicker, and with better hands.

Part of the fall out from the acquisition of Crayton though was the departure of our friend Dan Stratford, and the demotion of Joe Vide. Goff speculated, and I tend to agree, that cutting Strats probably had more to do with his foreign player status than his actual ability, which is unfortunate, but a necessary evil due to the discriminatory roster requirements of MLS. I liked Stratford, and although he didn't show much in his one league start, I saw more from him on the Reserve pitch. Unlike some other players (*cough Kirk cough*), Dan was involved in every play when on the field. I think he even wore the Captain's armband for the Reserves in one match I saw early in the year against Chicago. Strats being injured for the past two months also may have had something to do with his dismissal.

The popular sentiment following Stratford's departure was "Why not Dyachenko?" Now I don't think the club has any plans on cutting Dyachenko, but I do think sending him down to developmental status instead of Joe Vide would have sent a better message to the team. I really just don't understand why Vide would be signed to a senior contract to begin with, only to be knocked down three weeks later. So much for rewarding hard work.

Roller coaster continues

Despite knocking on wood as often as possible, I hate to admit that I called this. DC United was consistently crappy early in the year, and was consistently victorious just before the start of Superliga, but at all other times of the season, we've been horribly inconsistent. The team once again failed tonight to string together victories. And for the first time, I'm really starting to miss Gallardo.


1. It was just a couple weeks ago that I called Mike Zaher as a potential regular option for us at left back, and he proved it tonight. He made one great stand up tackle on Naissey, and even got involved in the attack. Quality first start for the rookie.


1. If it weren't for him being a step behind Twellman on the first goal, I would have called Marc Burch our man of the match. He made 6 good tackles that I noticed, and kept Joseph from having any good chances on New England's corners.

2. For the first 60 minutes of the match, I had Jaime Moreno slated as a Rail, but he really stepped it up after that and almost willed his team to a point. Loved the cheeky chip shot. The team seemed to follow Jaime's example as leader in this match. They were slow when he was slow, but then they also pushed when he pushed.


1. This was probably more due to some good defending by Parkhurst and Heaps, but I was disappointed in Luciano Emilio for not being more involved. Probably should also admit that the midfield did a poor job of getting him the ball.

2. In general we definitely lost the battle in the midfield, even when shifting to the 3-5-2. We could not maintain possession, and for that the blame should fall onto our holding midfielders Clyde Simms and Joe Vide. Both left the field way too open for Larentowicz to score his ugly goal. Simms continued his bad habit of giveaways, but I did like how he pushed forward more late in the match. Vide completely disappeared in the second half.

3. According to Johnson and Rongen, Quavas Kirk has been impressing the coaching staff playing as a forward lately in practice. I just don't see it. The dude needs to learn how to pass the ball to guys who are wearing United jerseys.

This was the type of match where we really could have used Marcelo Gallardo. Without him, and with Moreno largely uninvolved for most of the match, the team had no one to turn to in the midfield. No one to create. No one to generate an attack. And that ultimately led to turnovers. Maybe it was also the lack of Ivan Guerrero that contributed to our inability to maintain possession, but something's got to change. I'm really looking forward to this team one day being at full strength.

Off to watch our boys down in Guatemala. Hopefully they show better.

Cleaning the sheets

How's that for a confidence booster? With only 7 of our normal starting 11 in the lineup, and only 6 guys starting who started against KC in the season opener, United somehow came together to produce a big win and their first shutout of the year. With a first look at the starting lineups and the revelation that Ryan Pore was starting at forward, I kind of had a feeling that this could finally be THE ONE, and the team did not disappoint.


1. With apologies to Wellsy, the #1 performer in this match goes to Tom Soehn, who took a roster made of straw and spun it into gold. The straight 4-man midfield worked out surprisingly well, allowing the team to control possession for the majority of the match, and shifting the solid Namoff into central defense was the right decision here.

2. Zach Wells really earned the shutout in this match. He made two fantastic saves (one immediately after halftime, and one around the 66th minute) that easily could have been scores for KC, and if they had been scores, we all would have been sitting around saying that neither goal was Zach's fault. He put in a game changing performance last night, and to get his first clean sheet without los Gonzalos in the lineup might have made it feel even better.

3. Screw Budonovuddlen, I think the best forward-forward combination in the league right now is Luciano Emilio and Jaime Moreno. Moreno had a goal and an assist, adding to my plea that he be considered an MVP candidate. Is it just me, or has Emilio scored a lot of goals with his left foot this year?

4. Bryan Namoff really stepped up as the leader of the defense in this match. Made some great blocks and remained very involved in the attack, despite playing centrally. Hopefully no one in the USMNT camp watched this match, because if they did, Namoff might deserve some consideration.

5. Two very strong debuts from the two former Quakers Ivan Guerrero and Joe Vide. BDR makes a good point about how Guerrero's work rate (and I would add Vide's as well) helps free up Fred more, to allow Fred to be Fred. One assist in one game for DC is not too shabby for Guerrero. And although Vide can at times be a bit Dyachenkish in his challenges, he plays the enforcer role quite well. Maybe it's just the scruffy beard, but at times he almost reminded me of another UVA product.


1. Kudos to the rest of the defense Marc Burch, Devon McTavish, and Pat Carroll for helping the team earn its first shutout. Burch's biggest contribution came on the offensive end though with a perfectly placed free kick for Moreno's goal. But I agree with Fullback that the defense did make me a bit nervous a couple of times that we would lose the shutout because of a stupid mistake.

2. Hopefully everyone agrees that Fred just played his best game in many weeks. And he did it while playing on the wing, NOT in the middle. On the wing, where he belongs!


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So DC turned in a great game, and one that they really needed against a team who we were tied with for points before the match. DC is now solidly in third place in the East, with one game in hand over Chicago and two over Columbus. But that comes with a very tough stretch of matches ahead. Following a winnable game against the improving Red Bulls, United then faces NE at home, Chicago on the road, and NE on the road. It's the Open Cup semi-final match next Tuesday though that we should all consider the first MUST-WIN game of the year. Really a shame that it won't be seen on tv anywhere - I'll be in Ocean City that week :(

Mid-Season Review part 1: Acquisitions

Given the focus that this blog has given to United's roster this year, I thought it would be appropriate to base our Mid-Season Review specifically on the roster moves that the team has made. In part 1, we will look at United's acquisitions, meaning the players that the team added since the end of last season that they didn't have to give up anything for. Then we'll move on to look at players who departed since last year and United didn't receive anything in return for. Then in part 3 we'll look at the trades that the team has made. Then we'll end the review with a summary.

Here are the team's acquisitions since the end of the 2007 season, in order from most important to least:

1. I could dedicate an entire post to the trials and tribulations of Marcelo Gallardo, but that's already been done. Specifically here though, we should be discussing what Gallardo adds to United that they didn't have last year. In that regard, he is a playmaker with creativity that has not been seen here since the retirement of El Diablo. But there are doubts about whether or not that creativity is really what the team needed to add. Because with Christian Gomez last year, the team may not have been as creative, but they were certainly more successful. Before the season started, I was insistent that Gallardo was brought to DC because he gave us a better chance in international competitions than Gomez. So how's that going for us? Perhaps it's difficult to truly grade Gallardo's impact since he's been injured for two out of the three tournaments we've played in this year, but if he can guide us to an MLS Cup, or better yet a Champions League title in the months to come, all will be forgiven.

2. United completely rehauled the defense in the offseason with the acquisition of Los Gonzalos. So far, it has been Gonzalo Martinez who has appeared to be the most consistent new addition to the squad this year. He has quickly become one of the best left backs in the MLS, and despite calls for him to play centrally as he did at the start of the year, the left is where he is likely to stay. Gonzalo Peralta had some good games and some bad before going down to injury, and in that regard the early comparisons to Facundo Erpen seem appropriate. He won't have to fight very hard to regain his starting job in central defense from Burch when he returns to the field. But with the new look to United's backline, even though they SHOULD be better than the backline we had last year, why can we still not earn a clean sheet? The team had 8 last year.

3. Maybe the biggest surprise this year has come from the return of Santino Quaranta. With Olsen out, Quaranta has been a revelation (or am I going too far with that word?) on the right wing. He added some attacking flare opposite Fred that was an important part of the team's winning streak prior to his most recent injury before Open Cup. But has his 23-year-old body suffered too many injuries in his career for United to count on him long term? A return to health of Peralta and Mediate might push McTavish ahead of Tino on the depth chart at right wing.

4. Francis Doe has emerged of late as a talented attacking option next to Emilio. I had my doubts about him early on, but with two goals in the Superliga, Doe seems to have learned how to adjust to his new team quite nicely. And with Gallardo injured, Doe's continued production at forward will allow the team to move Moreno into the CAM role without losing too much.

5. Three rookies in Ryan Cordeiro, Dan Stratford, and Pat Carroll have been able to earn quality minutes with the first team this season. I wasn't the only one who criticized the team for drafting Cordeiro over other proven midfielders like Stephen King, but he instantly grabbed my eye in the reserve division, and looked pretty good against Houston in the Superliga finale. Stratford was the first rookie to earn first team minutes, and despite being pulled before half time in that game, the coaching staff certainly sees him as having a lot of potential. Strats picked a poor time to get injured though, because without Gallardo, I think a healthy Stratford will move above Dyachenko on the depth chart very shortly. The youngest Carroll has looked pretty good in Open Cup and Superliga appearances lately, but will likely lose playing time once Peralta, Mediate, and his brother Jeff return from injuries.

6. Three more rookies in Dane Murphy, Jeremy Barlow, and James Thorpe have yet to earn any first team apperances. Murphy has been on the 18-man gameday roster a couple of times, and I think he even got some action in the Rochester match. He's tall and a bit versatile. He seems to play mostly a central midfielder, but I wouldn't be surprised to see Soehn try to convert him into a defender. I saw Barlow score a goal in the opening Reserve Division match this year, but it doesn't seem like the club rates him too highly. He's got a good work rate, but will have to fight to keep his roster spot this offseason. I haven't seen Thorpe play yet, but at least he gave us the depth needed to be able to cut Carvallo from the roster.

7. I have my doubts about the acquisition of Joe Vide. I mean he was cut by San Jose of all places! I don't mind giving Vide a shot, since he was good enough to earn quite a few starts for the Red Bulls last year (yeah, but so could some of the women on my wife's team). But I feel like it might have been too much to give Vide a precious senior roster spot.

8. Let's not waste too much time by talking about these guys who aren't on the team anymore: Franco Niell, Jose Carvallo, and Jeff Curtin. Niell was not horrible in a United uniform, that is the few times that he was standing up (how could you tell?). But his salary was just too much for the team to keep around. I still feel like Frank O'Neal's biggest claim to fame should be this picture. Or this one. Carvallo stunk, we'll just leave it at that. It was unfortunate to lose Curtin due to injury, because he certainly could have been getting some minutes ahead of Burch in central defense if was still with the team.

So with all of those acquisitions, DC United should be a better team than last year. Right? Not so fast. Check back in the next few days for a look at all the players that United has lost.