More on El Capitan ... and more

Here's the gameday preview from The Chron (Ching: "At times we are (playing like a champion); we have glimpses of that." Kinnear: "It's been kind of a mixed bag.") and the associated notes.

I'm not a big fan of NY City as a place to live, but there certainly are a lot of benefits. How about a "pick-up" game in the park with Steven Nash and Thierry Henry? Here's a blog that covers the individual performances, and here's Ives' live (and brief) commentary and Ives discussing the question as to why Reyna can play here, but not for the team that signs his paycheck.

As for the pick-up game: Yeah, I'm jealous. At least we get the Free Kick Masters (which isn't free).

Stadium-ish news
How about this late-breaking news about a new practice facility for the Dynamo. This has been in the works for some time.

Mayor Bill White unveiled plans for a regional amateur sports complex to be
built on Houston’s south side Thursday. White joined community partners to
discuss the future facility and to announce plans for a private fundraising
campaign to support development.

The planned 100-acre, 18-field complex,
bounded by Highway 288 and Kirby Drive on the east and west sides and Sims Bayou
on the south, will provide a world-class soccer facility for Houston area youth
and adult league play. It will immediately become a soccer destination for
regional and major tournaments.

The first phase of the project provides
for street and infrastructure improvements and construction of eight soccer
fields at a cost of $10 million and is to be completed by December of 2009.
Within the next 90 days, public works officials will present to city council
plans for infrastructure to support the facility and a contract ready to be
awarded for the extension of Kirby Drive.

Plans are being developed to
make the complex the training home for the two- time MLS Cup Champion Houston
Dynamo and its youth programs.

I'm sure the Chronicle will have more information later today.

It's three points, so it gets two posts...

The weekend concludes with the Dynamo's 3 points putting them right back in the race for the Western Conference. They're 1 point from second and 2 from first. Go figure. Only DC United trails them in the Eastern Conference though.

As with any win (or loss), a little luck was involved. Still, the win was a deserved one.

I agree with others that Bobby Boswell played well. Onstad says "I thought Bobby Boswell had his best game of the season for us." He definitely saved the game outright on one occasion, and did his job stifling the attack throughout the game. I just wished he was better at passing the ball forward when he wins the ball, but he's got outside backs that do that just fine.

Our midfield is still solid and our backs now seem to be clicking, so we only need to worry about our forwards. Those Colorado forwards by the way, were fast. I thought for sure we'd get burned on a fast break. While we did get burned by their speed on their goal, it wasn't a true fast break I guess. I wonder if we can bottle up any of that speed to give to our forwards.

I linked to the "official" match report yesterday and here it is again. And here is another MLS article. "Now, for the first time since winning the MLS Cup last November, they won't have to talk about what could have been or what should have been."

The post game quotes are helpful in seeing which opponents are good sports (like Columbus Crew coach Sigi Schmid the last time we faced the Crew) and which are poor sports (like FC Dallas coach Morrow every time we face Dallas). Rapids Coach Fernando Clavijo toes the line of poor sportsmanship when he says "In the second half, I thought there was one team there." For portions of the second half, sure. But larger portions of the first half were all Dynamo, and a good portion of the second too. If he wants to apportion victory based on the time spent dominating the game, we win 3-1. So there. Regarding the handball, Clavijo says "The outcome should be decided by the two teams and I don't believe that today was the case." I hope that when he sees the replay of the game when he returns to Denver, he realizes the call was the right call and the ref didn't decide the game, Umo Imehelu decided the game when he used his arm to deny the ball from Barrett.

The 'Pids GK, Bouna Coundoul proves himself to be a moron when he says "I was expecting better from [the referee]." Since the ref made the right call, I guess he means that he expects the ref to allow his defenders to use their arms when their skills can't cut it. Then Coundoul adds the badge of poor sportsmanship to his cloak of torpidity when he states "They were lucky enough to get the 'W,' but they didn't deserve it. In the second half, we were the better team on the field. But sometimes, it's out of our hands when it comes to the referee." Again with the feeling that 15 or so minutes of solid play, plus another 15 or so of even play, means more than the remaining 60 or so that saw you on the defensive. The math doesn't even support it, much less the Laws of the Game.

And you know what? You'd have had more time to get the equalizer you needed if you didn't take 15 seconds to get the ball back in play every time you touched it. More of your precious time was wasted by your 'mate Mastroeni, who spent more than a minute and a half rolling on the carpet because of contact that is but a small fraction of what he unleashes on others repeatedly through the game. I think if you had been behind, he would have found his cheek to have not been hurt severely enough to stall play. Something to think about Coundoul: stalling can hurt you in the end.

Back to the media. Here's The Chronicle's story on the match and the Dynamo Notes. B-Fall's player grades are here.

Jarrambide has a good summary of the game in Glenn Davis' blog.

A final word. Most of us root for the Dynamo because of geographic coincidence; we happen to be located in or near the town in which the Dynamo play. But the reason we become passionate supporters and recurring rooters is because the Dynamo never quit, they play exciting ball regardless of the result, and the players are good sportsmen and upstanding people. Check out this article (also mentioned by Lark). The Dynamo -- the Men In Orange -- are great guys. Plain and simple. It's easy to root for guys like these.

Coaching a Great Club

I've been thinking back to our loss to the last place team last Saturday. There's an old sports adage that says that players are responsible for victories while coaches are responsible for losses. Thus, as with any loss, some lay the blame of the RSL loss at the feet of Dom. To his credit, Dom, himself, took complete responsibility for the loss in his post-match interview.

For my part, I'm pretty pleased with the coaching philosophy displayed by Dom on Saturday. Tired though the team was, and playing away at semi-altitude, he still adopted an offensive game. Even in the second half, when a draw looked likely, he made attack-oriented substitutions with Jaqua and Ashe. This attitude is a credit to Dom and to the team. It shows that we are not like the Revolution and other MLS teams that sit back hoping for a counter and pleased with a tie. Too many MLS teams rely on that negative strategy, which may generate results, but it repulses fans; It's not the beautiful game, it's parasitic poaching.

(Read some excellent thoughts along the same vein by an RSL supporter here. "Playing for the win was the act of a true Champion. While it failed to pay off last night...in the long run this attitude is what separates the great clubs from all the rest.")

Yes, the lads were tired (and rightfully so) on Saturday. They've had a front-loaded campaign that began earlier (and with more intensity) than their MLS counterparts due to the CONCACAF Champions Cup, and recent SuperLiga matches have drained the legs further. Everyone (media, coach, and players) have observed the fatigue factor, while also stating that they don't want to use it as an excuse. (But still they mention it.) For this reason, I think that if Dom made a mistake, it wasn't that he kept his usual attacking strategy; that is the mark of a coach for a "great club." If he made a mistake, it was that he didn't go outside his "First XI" on Saturday.

One of the questions about the Dynamo -- the team's depth -- has become one the strengths of the Dynamo, as witnessed by the great run that started with the absence of DeRo, Ching, Clark, and Onstad. Given this fact, Dom could have rested a lot of his starters and relied on the support crew on Saturday. This would give his First 11 the rest that they need, and would provide valuable experience to the backups. If necessary, some of the first teamers could have come in as subs when they'd be able to face tired opponents.

By playing his starting 11, Dom showed his intent to treat every MLS game as meaningful, but he may have missed an opportunity to give his reserves some valuable experience, and may have jeopardized our readiness for Pachuca next week as Dynamo-H continues its quest for a million bucks.

All this is easy to say after the fact, of course. Had Dom played a B-team on Saturday, and had we lost, there'd be questions about his choice to jeopardize our MLS standings. There's also the question of how deep in the Reserves should Dom have gone to give his Starting 11 a rest. The whole team was tired. It's not unusual to see our forwards or middies exhausted by the end of a match, but when our indefatigable defenders are flagging, you know the fatigue is chronic. Do we have enough Reserves to fill all three levels on the field? And how deep should Dom have gone? Should he have given our greenest guys (e.g. Chabala, Hayden, and Ustruck) a shot? We have some good choices for the front line (Dalglish and Wondo) who weren't used, but injuries and DeRo's absence have diminished our options at Midfield. In the back line, the argument could have been made that Ianni should have played more to spell one of the other defenders, but Ianni is actually just as likely to start one of the next few matches as, say, Cochrane, so resting Ianni wouldn't hurt us.

And there's also the fact that we had a Reserve game the next day versus RSL, so anyone who was rested on Saturday would probably have had to play on Sunday anyway. Given this, Dom elected to play his A-team in the match that mattered. At least he rested DeRo for the whole weekend (RSL played Andy Williams for the entirety of the Reserve match).

I guess the only sure thing to say is that Dom showed that he operates with the coaching philosophy of a top-tier manager. While it sure would have been nice if we could have magically rested our players, it seems only the forwards had obvious substitutes waiting in the wings.

And coming up: a match at altitude versus Colorado. This match will have a bigger impact on our readiness for Pachuca. With the SuperLiga semifinals a few days away, how will Dom approach Colorado? Will our desire to avenge the CONCACAF series with Pachuca make Colorado yet another weak team (alongside Chicago, Toronto, and RSL) to get a result against the Orange? These are great questions that we can only see, unfortunately, on HDNet this weekend. I guess I've got to find a sportsbar with HDNet...

Go 'Mo!

MLS & the Fourth Estate

Here are a few articles with an overseas take of the MLS (and US Soccer):

MLS reaps the rewards of a quiet footballing revolution
Most candid quote: Judged solely on footballing quality, a typical MLS side is more mid-table Championship level, and perhaps slightly better than the average Scottish Premier League team.
Best line: If you want to poke fun at the wacky venue names then Dick's Sporting Goods Park and Pizza Hut Park are begging to be ridiculed.

Reality bites for big-talking Galaxy
Best prognosticating line: So LA's saving grace might be that things in MLS rarely go the way you'd expect, and the Galaxy may win their next six games regardless of form and injuries.

Americans are soccer-savvy ... and that scares little Englanders
Best line: Face it, feeling superior to Americans is about all we've got left. But the list of things we actually do better than the Yanks is slim and getting slimmer. Did you know that the bastards even brew decent beer these days?

(Speaking of which, buy local: St. Arnold)

And here's some comments that originated in LA, then went overseas, before coming back here. Alexi Lalas is having some fun at the expense of the English, methinks:
There's this delusion that the Premiership is great
Most interesting comparison of the EPL and MLS: "The MLS is much more physically challenging than people expect. There is a lot of running and hard tackling, a lot of heat and travel." And "English football now has the haves and the have-nots, and even the top four in the Premiership may be narrowing down to two. But because of the structure of our league and the salary cap our competition runs deep."