United Kick Off Champs League With a Whimper
DC United kicked off competition on yet another front – The CONCACAF Champions League – last night looking like a decidedly haggard squad. Jaime Moreno was on the bench. The $1.9 million-per-year Marcel Gallardo was back in Argentina for further rehab, leaving his total games played for the season at 14. That’s over 100 grand per game, spaced out over 7 months. Nice work if you can get it. Also absent was his fellow countryman, defender Gonzalo Peralta, while Coach Tom Soehn decided to he’d had enough of the shutouts and re-installed Zach Wells as keeper.
But facing this second-rate United squad was a first-rate one, at least by CONCACAF standards. Costa Rican champs Deportivo Saprissa featured no fewer than six Costa Rican internationals and entered the 2008 competition as defending champs. Unsurprisingly, they duly took the game to United, camping out in DC’s half of the field, dominating possession, and creating all the good chances. Forward Alejandro Alzipar was lively early, dispossessing Quaranta in midfield before carrying at the defense and hitting a subtle loft that was just high of Wells’ net. Minutes later Wells was forced into a diving block when defender Randall Porras took a well-worked corner kick and struck a rasping twenty-five yard drive towards the back post. DC finally got what they deserved when Saprissa’s goal finally came in the 31st minute. Alzipar gained possession in the area, but McTavish couldn’t react quickly enough to a poor touch. Alzipar flailed on the ground but still poked the ball to Walter Centeno who side-footed a saveable shot past Wells from 18 yards.
To compound DC’s misery – or perhaps put an unofficial but early end to it – McTavish was ejected five minutes later. DC midfielder Santino Quaranta fouled Alexander Robinson, but as the whistle blew McTavish hacked down another Saprissa player. Mexican ref Marco Rodriguez produced an immediate and entirely unjustified red card to McTavish for what was, at worst, a cautionable offense. The second half was no different, and when Jairo Arrieta picked up yet another poor clearance and blasted a tremendous left-footed shot past Wells, the outcome was practically academic. But the small crowd of 6,000 was forced to watch forty more minutes of DC midfield futility, improved only by a couple well-struck Marc Burch free kicks that earned saves from Saprissa keeper Navas.
The 2-0 loss isn’t a disaster – there are still five more group games to go. But you get the growing sense that after the SuperLiga, the US Open Cup, the CONCACAF Champions Cup, and now the Champions League, it may just be too much for the team to make a real run in the MLS playoffs. We’ll get a better idea though on Saturday, when DCU flies out to L.A. to take on former coach Bruce Arena and his miserable, miserable LA Galaxy who couldn’t be more desperate.