It has to be said that tonight's postgame press conference in the bowels of RFK Memorial Stadium was not full of champagne and high fives. But it was still a hell of a lot more upbeat than any other presser in the last two months. It's all thanks to D.C. United's losing streak busting 1-1 draw with the visiting Sporting Kansas City, who had owned United previously with five consecutive one-goal victories over the Black-and-Red.
Two of the league's best face off on Sunday as the Los Angeles Galaxy visit the New York Red Bulls at Red Bull Arena.
In the only meeting between the two clubs, Landon Donovan and Robbie Keane look to build off their terrific performances last Wednesday in a 4-1 victory over the Philadelphia Union.
Think of somebody you'd want to play if you were an MLS team on the ropes and riding a seven-game losing streak. Now picture the exact opposite. There's a good chance you're thinking of Sporting Kansas City, D.C. United's opponents tonight. Here goes nothing.
Happy United Day, boys and girls! This afternoon at RFK Stadium, D.C. United will host Sporting Kansas City in what we can only hope will be MLS' upset of the week. So, to get us ready for the match, we exchanged a few questions with Ben Gartland, the Managing Editor of SB Nation's Sporks site The Daily Wiz.
Sporting KC visits DC United today at 4:00 PM. Join @417Loyal and @SoccerOzarks as we cheer on the boys from our local home base.
by Ben Garland
The last time that Sporting KC and Handball DC United met Sporting stole a win late after Soony Saad put a ball in position for Claudio Bieler to score the match winner in the 89th minute.
Tomorrow's game against DC United at RFK Stadium is a classic trap game for Sporting Kansas City. Sporting comes into the game coming off a big win over Houston on the road last week. DC on the other hand comes in on the backs of a 7 game winless run and lost their last home game 4-0 to Houston. So DC is at a point of extreme pressure to get a result.
All the way back in 2009, D.C. United arrived at CommunityAmerica Ballpark to play some team named the "Kansas City Wizards" in the last game of the regular season, and everything was on the line. Thanks to a logjam on the fringe of the playoff race, United would have qualified for the postseason despite a season fraught with injuries, tired legs (14 non-MLS competitive fixtures!
Join the podcast crew as we explore the depths of our misery as D.C. United fans in 2013. We start off by looking at Ben Olsen's lineup and tactical changes in the midst of a combined 6-1 beatdown on D.C. United over two legs by the state of Texas. In the harsh light of United's performances against the Houston Dynamo and FC Dallas, we also ask ourselves at what point focus will shift from this long slog of a season to building for 2013.
The letting the kids play experiment worked as well as anything else has this year, and so I expect that Ben Olsen will stay with at least parts of that starting 11 when D.C. United takes on Sporting Kansas City this Sunday. But, for the second week in a row, the key question is about Chris Pontius' groin.
Happy Tuesday, ladies and gentlemen. We play Sporting Kansas City this weekend, if you didn't know. So I'm sure we're totally about to turn this thing around. This game is a gimme. We got this.
Feature: Kyle Porter | D.C. United
Confidence key in unlocking winger's potential! That's it, guys.
Sporting KC return to action again tomorrow against the Houston Dynamo. It'll be the 3rd game in just over a week for both teams. The two teams though have looked quite different over the past week. While Houston has looked quite good, taking 6 points on the road against LA and an admittedly poor DC United, KC took 3 points from two home games against Chivas USA and Seattle.
On Wednesday, May 15, Robbie Russell announced he is retiring from soccer and will enroll in Georgetown University's Post-baccalaureate Pre-Medical Certificate Program. Listen to the veteran defender discuss his plans for life after MLS.
RELATED: Read Steven Goff's article on Russell's retirement
Don't miss this one! Philadelphia Union midfielder/defender Amobi Okugo talks about sports movies, playing D-min, and more. In the second segment, friend of the show Sebastian Salazar from CSN Houston goes around the league with Roche.
Okugo is a student and a student of the game. He and Roche talk about his online courswork and his knowledge of the of soccer especially recent great defensive mids.
WASHINGTON — D.C. United fans for weeks now have been awaiting the arrival of reinforcements to help end this club's dramatic downward spiral. At training Tuesday, former U.S. national team defender Frank Simek was presented as one possible piece of that roster retooling puzzle.
Since Frank Simek's release from Carlisle United, he's been looking for an opportunity to play. That chance just may end up coming in Major League Soccer.
According to D.C. United, Simek took part in the club's training session on Tuesday morning as a trialist, opening a possibility for the American international defender to play in MLS for the first time.
Busy week in Major League Soccer with a host of mid-week games and a packed weekend, so we will jump right into attendance. The early games started in with DC United, with less than 11k at RFK to watch DC fall 4-0 in another disappointing outing for the Black and Red. The Red Bulls fell just short of 12k in their mid-week effort, while KC managed its usual 18,500 plus.
Word broke today from the assembled D.C. United press that the team has two trialists in camp: English striker Akpo Sodje and American defender Frank Simek. Simek is a right back who has played for Sheffield Wednesday in the Football League Championship and has spent the last three seasons with Carlisle United in League One.
The last time these teams met, in a match that fans in the Nation's Capital can only hope will repeat itself on Saturday night, D.C. hosted the Toros last spring in a match that busted United's scoring woes and set the tone for a successful spring for the Black-and-Red.
This led the official site this morning instead of a game recap, because of course. If you ignore the bad things, maybe they'll go away. Good for Nick, though.
United vs. Dynamo: D.C. falls flat at home in 4-0 loss | Washington Post
The first of a few recaps, in case you want to re-live what happened last night.
Happy Monday, ladies and gentlemen. We have the worst team in MLS and the playoffs are looking like a near impossibility if we don't make a couple of spectacular signings and make a couple of miracle trades. That's not happening, so sit back and just laugh when we concede for the rest of the season.
D.C. United lost yet again, this time to FC Dallas, in the same way that they have lost most of their games this season: giving up an early goal and then being forced to chase the rest of the game. When your team is pressing for over an hour each game, more goals for the opponent are often the result.
Not to state the overwhelmingly obvious, but FC Dallas needed a win over a reeling D.C. United team on Saturday night in what could definitely be called the definition of a true "trap game". United was heading to Frisco on a six-game losing streak and head coach Ben Olsen juggled his lineup to try and find a spark for a club desperate for a win.
That was a great result for us. We started off the game very well, scored a very nice goal. We went into a 4-4-2 formation so we could play Eric [Hassli] and Blas [Perez] together. We had speed on both flanks with Jackson and Fabian [Castillo].
Five changes to the lineup, a new twist on the formation and a focus on attacking the game early. Ben Olsen finally threw the kitchen sink at D.C. United's six-game losing streak on Saturday night. But it wasn't enough, as the Black-and-Red dropped a 2-1 result to FC Dallas in Frisco, Tex.
United started well enough, controlling possession through the midfield trio of Perry Kitchen, Raphael Augusto and Dwayne De Rosario and pressing Dallas all around the field.
FC Dallas' scorching start to 2013 has been paced by fluid midfield play, quality depth and opportunistic finishing. D.C. United's bumbling run has included plenty of early deficits and set-piece struggles.
So all in all, Saturday's meeting at FC Dallas Stadium went exactly as expected.
If you had to pick the worst possible road trip to take while riding a six-game losing streak, trip to Friso, Tex. might not be the top of the list, but it would probably be in the top 3. At least for D.C. United. (For the record, a trip to Houston and playing the Galaxy away would be the others.) But that's exactly what's on tap for tonight, as United travel to play FC Dallas.
The team with the best record in MLS takes on the team with the worst record as FC Dallas play host to D.C. United tonight in one of the day's more intriguing match-ups.
The biggest mismatch of today's seven matches will be worth watching to see if D.
Maybe Schellas Hyndmandoesn'texactly believe in the term "trap game," but judging from his comments about DC United, who currently sports the worst record in Major League Soccer at 1-7-1 and just four points, whom FC Dallas will host on Saturday night, illustrate that neither he nor his team will be taking the Black-and-Red lightly this weekend.
On Saturday night, FC Dallas will host DC United in the second game of a span of three matches within 10 days. Of course, DC was a playoff team last fall, finishing second in the Eastern Conference with 58 points (17-10-3).
However, things have swung in the opposite direction for the Black-and-Red so far this season as United currently sits 1-7-1 with just four points after being blanked 4-0 by Houston at RFK Stadium on Wednesday night.
Sometimes life isn't fair. When you're coming off a catastrophic loss - a loss that may qualify as the worst in club history - the last thing you want to have to do is fly out to a venue you've never done that well at to play the team atop the MLS standings. Then again, maybe this is a classic case of making your own luck: Teams that waste gifts like getting the Dynamo on 66 hours rest (which included a cross-country flight and missing five useful second-choice players as well as a starter) don't deserve fairness from the fates.
The fact that FC Dallas was missing three starters and still came away with a point in Wednesday's 1-1 draw with Portland was a nice achievement in itself. Of course, two regulars FCD was without were linking midfielder Andrew Jacobson (hamstring) and center back George John (knee).
It remains to be seen whether or not Jacobson and/or John will be back for Saturday's visit from DC United.
While it remains to be seen whether or not David Ferreira, who left in the second half of a 1-1 draw with Portland on Wednesday night with a hamstring injury, will be able to play on Saturday night against DC United, one has to wonder if indeed the 2010 MLS MVP can't answer the bell then who would fill in for him?
D.C. United goalkeeper Bill Hamid will be returning to the USMNT after being called to the 26 player roster by head coach Jurgen Klinsmann.
CHICAGO (May 16, 2013) - U.S. Men's National Team head coach Jurgen Klinsmann has called in 26 players to begin training camp in Cleveland in advance of the five-game stretch in May and June that includes three FIFA World Cup Qualifiers and the Centennial Celebration Match against Germany.
Forward Giles Barnes, who was tied for the team lead with four goals, was out with a right hamstring strain he suffered Wednesday night against D.C. United.
With Barnes unavailable, veteran Brian Ching and rookie Jason Johnson were the only other healthy true forwards available to pair with co-scoring leader Will Bruin.
Believe it or not, D.C. United has another match this weekend, against league leading FC Dallas in Frisco, Texas. And with the current lineup failing to get results, it may be time to experiment even further. The whole point of the USL Pro-MLS Reserve League loan agreement was to get the young players at the end of each team's bench some quality experience so that they would be able to break into the main team at some point.
This morning rumors have been flying that Erick Thohir, Indonesian media mogul and an owner of the Philadelphia 76ers and D.C. United, wants to buy into Inter Milan of the Italian Serie A. Thohir apparently wants to buy 51% of the club, while the current owners only want to sell him 20-30%. In something that will sound familiar to D.
On a rainy night at RFK Stadium, D.C. United lost its fourth straight home match, and seventh overall, of the young 2013 season. While the crowd was expected to be small for the season's only Wednesday night game at home, it appeared only about half of the announced 10,100 fans actually showed up.
