Still no left back, but the slight defensive midfield depth issue has been addressed with the signing of Brazilian journeyman Marcelo Saragosa. Given that Kitchen will surely miss time for Olympic qualifiers (and the big show in London if we qualify) and isn't exactly a sure thing as he steps into his first year in the role for which he's being groomed, depth was a concern.

Could this Kiwi have clipped United's Canuck quotient?

Between trips to sunnier climes, United did a little trialist-pruning, releasing journeyman veterans Zayner and Svard along with the Suppie pickup Charles Rodriguez (conveniently just after the last Roster Reset...sigh). Kasper promises more trialists for the Arizona jaunt, but what I really want to see are (a) game time for Salihi against the MLS opposition on offer there and (b) a left back, any left back.

Does this man have your goals?

So are they done?

United ticked one of the two big "need" boxes by acquiring Albanian international striker Hamdi Salihi as a designated player (wait, I thought Uncle Will wasn't going to splash the cash?). Given his impressive rate of return wherever he's played, he certainly seems to fit the poacher's bill, though he also has decent size.

The boxes are being ticked, slowly but surely. With the addition of central defender Emiliano Dudar, the depth acquisition project seems all but complete. Still, the two biggest needs, left back and finisher the ones we've been pointing to all offseason, remain frustratingly unfilled. Stefan Jerome, recently arrived on trial, would be a nice project up top (can't believe he's only 19 my memories of him as a U 17 seem distant), but isn't the finished product.

One of the issues with depth charts and roster math is how to place players who can fill many roles. With Adam Johansson in Qatar for the opening of training camp, Seattle Sounders coach Sigi Schmid gets to test a bunch of different options at the right back role. One thing quickly clear when asked was who the leader in that role is:

Obviously Zach Scott is somebody who can play there.

Not a striker.

The fight is on for roster spots as half of last Reset's trialists are gone and new faces arrive for the Florida camp. I'm still not seeing the potential for significant improvement in the weakest areas (finisher, left back), but at least we're no longer stuck in stasis-land and the depth issues look like being addressed.

Missile Swap: Out with the Clydewinder, in with the Cruz?

Don't look now, but the glacial pace of United's roster assembly is starting to pick up. Hot on the heels of the Maicon Santos acquisition comes the signing of former Dynamo right mid Danny Cruz1, leaving the current roster + trialists looking like this.

First the good.
In acquiring Danny Cruz, United looks to have settled the flank depth question, initially addressed by the drafting of Nick DeLeon as Pontius' backup. A regular starter for the MLS Cup finalists from Houston, Cruz provides excellent cover for Najar, who will likely be away for Olympic and possibly World Cup duty with Honduras and may even attract interest from abroad this summer.

Thursday morning marks the beginning of training camp for the Seattle Sounders. Training camp is the MLS version of musical chairs. While the music is playing every one at the party gets to play. But once the music stops, some of these men are going to find themselves without a seat. The current roster of 28 players will be augmented in camp by 7 draftees and a collection of trialists.

Praying for goals.

Movement at last! Maicon Santos makes it 15 for Salary Budget players, and United drops a 14-trialist bomb as pre-season camp gets underway. Of course, the majority of the trialists are guys with limited to no MLS experience, but such was always going to be the major source to roster depth1.

Nick DeLeon, courtesy dcunited.com

Hey, look, finally an addition to the roster! United picked up versatile attacker (is he a winger, a forward, an attacking midfielder?...Hmm, I'm sensing a pattern here) Nick DeLeon1 in the SuperDraft. I don't watch much collegiate ball, so I'm not going to pass any judgement on the pick.

Based on the current roster list on United's web site and the little scraps of information we have to go on, I thought I'd begin the Roster Reset in advance of the SuperDraft and the absolute rafts of new signings the United brain trust are just waiting to announce (hello, sarcasm, you insufferable trollop).

To wrap things up with the "What I Want For Christmas" series, we'll begin with a bit of a tactical aside before prioritizing the shopping list...

(In case you missed the beginning of this discussion: Part I and Part II are available.)

Our likely man in the middle?

In all of this discussion, we've curiously ignored tactics for the most part.

In the first part of this series, we ran the rule over the current United roster. In this second part, we'll compile a list of wants by position, setting us up for the grand finale, where we put those wants in order...

Would you trust this man with your roster?

GOALKEEPER

Needs: Hamid and Willis are solid in the first two spots on the depth chart, so there shouldn't be much work to do here.

Goff's version of the protected list is out, so I thought I'd stir from my hibernation1 to do some comparisons. (Revisit my list in four parts by hitting the links highlighted in the sidebar.)

• On both lists: Willis, Jakovic, De Rosario, Kitchen, McDonald, Pontius, Quaranta, Wolff
• Goff also protects: Korb, Woolard, King
• I also protect: Boskovic, Brettschneider, da Luz

We're in alignment on a number of points beyond the obvious (De Rosario, Kitchen, Pontius).

Fullerton, CA Saturday's contest featured two underachieving teams that were looking to hold on for dear life in the Big West. Both sides were in desperate need of 3 points. Luis Silva came into the game and pretty much single-handedly carried the Gauchos to a 4-3 victory putting on a show in the process.

In the first three parts of this series, I worked my way through the thick weeds of the roster, pruning and purging. On the far side, I arrived with the roster sorted into the following categories...

• PROTECT: De Rosario, Jakovic, Kitchen, Pontius
• EXPOSE: Barklage, Burch, Cronin, Davies, Korb, McTavish, Morsink, Ngwenya, Woolard, Zayner
• BUBBLE: Boskovic, Brettschneider, da Luz, King, McDonald, Quaranta, Simms, Willis, Wolff
• N/A: Hamid, Najar, Shanosky, White

Four of the twenty-seven players on the roster don't need to be sheltered from the rapacious grasp of L'Impact de Montreal by virtue of their being home grown talents.

In Parts I and II we looked at the first two-thirds of United's roster in an attempt to compile preliminary lists of players to PROTECT, players to EXPOSE, players on the BUBBLE, and players who didn't have to be protected (N/A) for the expansion draft at the end of November that will stock L'Impact's stables for 2012.

About the domestic league...

...sort of.

Let me explain.

First, the schedule of events over the next four or five days. Today, "voting" on MLS Awards "Part I," Saturday, more, Sunday more, Monday "voting" on MLS Awards Part Final (Best XI). Note, on that Best XI, TSG won't chicken out and go with three defenders LAME!

Can't fault the second half effort1. Can't fault the entertainment value. Can't argue we didn't deserve to crash out either. Heroic last-ditch efforts aside, it was over the last four games that the ghost was well and truly given up, not this one match that sealed the deal.

Talking points?

As the game wound to a close, I was toying with an opening line for a reaction post, something along the lines of: "These two teams could play for 90 days instead of 90 minutes and never find the damn net."
So imagine my surprise when a late whistle finally answered a United attacker flinging himself to the ground in the box.

You want me to recant? To say that Wednesday's Reaction Post was a mistake?

Keep waiting.

I suppose if I were going to be really cynical, I'd point out that our first team could absolutely dominate the MLS Reserve League[1]. I'm not going to go there. I'm going to give United credit for finishing chances, for learning their lessons from last time around, and for generally answering the challenge Olsen laid down.

Editor's note: While this game occurred last week, we still find it worthwhile to publish. If anything to continue demonstrating what form a simple match breakdown/recap could take, what things to look for in a game, give praise or criticism to the coaches and players involved, and well .

Woot! Woot!

All aboard! And away we go.... (yes, you'll see this image a few more times this year.)

All aboard the Perlaza MEGABUS!

Three matches all with playoff implication.

FC Vollkswagen vs. FC Corona as Charlie Davies, DeRo and friends (minus Pontius) hope that games-in-hand are a blessing not a curse down the stretch.

Guess what? United are a middle of the road club. They slot in somewhere between the also-rans like Chivas and the league elites like Seattle. Hard to find these last couple of results shocking when you put things in that perspective, is it? Nor was it surprising to see United struggle offensively in their first game without their second most influential attacking player1.

Listen.

I sat down at the keyboard last night and stared at the screen. Nothing. I just couldn't get jazzed to write a reaction piece. Some of that was because I could copy and paste many of my prior talking points. Some was because the match was pretty dull.

But the main reason was because the result was so infuriatingly predictable.

Sorry for no United match reaction this weekend; a youth soccer tournament intervened. That said, watching my girls roller-coaster through the tournament was a lot like watching United's uneven 2011 progress. So much so, in fact, that those thirteen girls in red shirts running through the rain were starting to look distinctly like tea leaves in which I could read United's valiant, but ultimately futile, stretch run.

Astonishing. I'm not really sure what to think, what sort of coherent narrative I can assemble to summarize the absolute incompetence that defined this match. It was like Christmas in August: both teams (or all three if I include the officials) dishing the gifts left and right. Should I be pleased with a point having played a man down for over 90 minutes (stoppage time included) or disappointed at not beating a side we need to be beating?

D.C. United v Toronto FC
8/6/2011, Saturday, 7:30 PM
RFK Stadium

Last Four Head-to-Head:

4/16/11 3-0 D.C. United (a) (Pontius x2, Davies)
3/12/11 2-2 Draw (n) (Davies, Ngwenya; De Rosario, Santos) (Carolina Challenge Cup)
10/23/10 2-3 Toronto (h) (Quaranta, Moreno; De Rosario x2, Santos)
9/11/10 1-0 D.

Busy couple of weeks, busy weekend. All conspiring to keep my post production low, and that means...Grab Bag time.

Better Up Top

Those damnable "local blackouts" applied, leaving me with only the Match Day Live condensed version of the United vs. Quakes tilt. Obviously, I feel pretty unqualified to deal in minutiae as a result, but that won't keep me from making the one obvious observation: De Rosario needs to be up top.

The Youth Movement

As the DC United roster of last season was dismantled and retooled it became apparent we were amidst a rebuilding process focused around youth. The foundation of the team came from young players such as Najar, Pontius and Jakovic and was being complimented by Davies, Kitchen and McCarty.

Philadelphia Union at DC United
Saturday night's contest was an exciting one, at least on paper leading up to the match, as it put the Eastern Conference leading Philadelphia Union on the road at DC United, who were excited to show off their new acquisition, MLS All-Star Dwayne DeRosario.

Quotes?
Ben...

Again, it was a long week for Dwayne; so right after the second goal I was going to pull him out for Joe [Ngwenya]. But we needed a goal, and you don't take De Rosario off if you need a goal.

Nor do you bring on Ngwenya. Can't believe we're hanging on to him.

Midweek swaps saw two new faces appear in Ben Olsen's starting eleven. Unfortunately, the DJ was playing the same sorry tune when it came to the match itself. Good moments going forward, patchy periods of possession, and, of course, the inevitable defensive comedy routines. You'd think we'd have worn out that record by now.

So I was part of the way though prepping a series of posts on probable moves for DC United in the summer transfer window when...

McBoom!

De Boom!

Boom goes my post series.

Hmmm. The best laid plans of mice and fullbacks, eh? Instead of tossing out the whole thing, let me just post what would have been the key conclusions in that series and look at how the moves for De Rosario and McDonald address (or don't address) what I saw as the outstanding needs for United at the midway point.

Benny says...

I just thought overall our energy wasn't great tonight.

But Charlie says...

It's a game where I think we worked extremely hard.

And Pontius says...

We worked very hard

Hmmm.

I watched quite a bit of soccer over Father's Day weekend and was pleased to see the two teams I follow most closely get results. Sadly however, I'm left with a sour taste in my mouth and very little time to do full reaction posts. Instead, I'll slam a couple together and bind them with the one central theme that dominated the two most important matches (to me, anyway).

Five games unbeaten? Shutout with three rooks on the back line? Road point against the league leaders and looking the more likely to win if anybody did?
Impressive. Even if the Galaxy were missing a couple of key offensive cogs. Some quick thoughts...
* Josh Wolff has had four fantastic looks at net over the last couple of games.

Apologies for the long silence. The dust is beginning to settle1, so I'm just going to try to get back into the routine swing of things by making a few observations...

1. Okay, okay. I hear your digital consensus: Pontius has been playing quite well of late. Still, every so often, I'm tempted to throw something at the screen when his ambitions outstrip his talent.

Image via yfrog

OK, are you looking at a) Pontius' torso, b) Charlie Davies' cute, 'I want to get in on this, but I'm hesitant in case the animal bites me and makes me look a fool' expression or c) the plastic tubs placed in descending size order in the background?

If you chose a), then you're shallow, but in like-minded company.