It was a good news / bad news day Saturday.
Good news: DeRo returned and played a full 90, showing some of his crafty play.
Bad news: Thiago played a full 90, and showed his crafty play by netting a goal...as well as desperately blocking several of our shots.
Good news: Dynamo won the possession game, had more than twice the number of shots as the Fire, and played some exciting soccer.
Bad news: Dynamo scored zero goals, exactly one less than the Fire.
Good news: The Dynamo defense stepped up, limiting the Fire to one shot on goal in the first half and one in the second.
Bad news: Only one of the two shots on goal were saved.
The pedestrian Chicago Fire somehow continued their unbeaten run in six games on their opening road trip odyssey before Bridgeview is completed. Early in the second half, Thiago the Brazilian channeled DeRo and drove from the halfway line, through our defense, nutmegging Eddie Robinson on his merry way, and made what looked like an effortless shot from just outside the penalty area, eluding Onstad’s outstretched hands. I had glanced down to deal with a hotdog issue my son was having and looked up just in time to see Thiago’s shot. I caught his implausible run on the replays.
Dynamo played a strong game overall, especially in the midfield. In the first half, Houston midfielder Ricardo Clark fought hard in the box and created a shot to the inside post that Fire goalkeeper Zach Thornton saved.
Moments after the second half began, I was in the bathroom with my son. But I heard that DeRo made one of his blistering runs into the Chicago box and fired into the side net...then Brad Davis had a great shot that was blocked by a sliding Thiago.
With a little over a minute to play in the game, Moreno managed to fight through a beleaguered defender who was holding the ball up on the penalty spot. Winning the ball, Moreno shot the ball past a motionless Thornton and into the net...but the ref ruled that Moreno had shoved the defender and gave the Fire a free kick instead. In stoppage time, Dynamo won a corner. Onstad moved to the halfway line and everyone else was in the box. A series of shots ensued (including substitute Kelly Gray header that banged off the crossbar), but Houston remained unlucky.
Dominic Kinnear rarely makes substitutes, but he used all three of his substitutes in this game. Was this due to the heat, or is it a commentary on the quality of our play? In the 77th minute he replaced Cerritos with newcomer, Julian Nash, and also pulled Ryan Cochrane (who started in place of injured Serioux) for Kevin Goldthwaite. I think both of these changes came due to performance: Cerritos was not creating opportunities up front and Cochrane had lost us several possessions (kicking the ball into touch) even when we weren’t under pressure. Or, Kinnear may have thought Goldthwaite was a more attack-minded defender than Cochrane. In the 86th minute, Waibel was pulled for Kelly Gray. This may have been due to the heat.
The day was hot -- in the upper 80s -- but there was a cool breeze that we spectators could at least enjoy. It was still hot for a 90 minute track meet. The 3 o’clock kick off was dictated by the programming schedule of ESPN2. It would have been nice if we could have provided a better show for the national audience.
Next up, the always tough (except this past Saturday) New England Revolution in Foxboro, Massachusetts. Should be a very tough game, but an exciting one.
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