As I sat on my perch inside RFK Stadium last night, preparing to witness the fifteenth home opener in D.C. United’s history with 20,664 of my closest friends, my thoughts didn’t wander to how new center back Juan Manuel Pena would perform, or how large the ovation would be for Salvadoran newcomer Cristian Castillo or even to what the bass levels were on Wale’s amps on the Armory Mall as reverberations of his pre-game set echoed through the stadium’s corridors. No, I thought about the pitch; more specifically, how a winter college football bowl, yet again, made RFK’s pitch look downright terrible.

Of course, that was until ten minutes from time, when my train of thought, rather forcefully, shifted to how New England substitute Kenny Mansally ruined a perfectly good chance for United to pick up their first points of the 2010 season.

Mansally, a substitute in the 68th minute, scored two goals — one fluky, the other not so much — in two minutes, and New England notched a surprise, twelfth-round knockout over D.C., 2-0. It was hard to not be disappointed with the way that United — who controlled large portions of the match against the Revolution — suddenly found themselves on the wrong end of proceedings.

Head coach Curt Onalfo described Mansally’s bang-bang tallies as a result of poor luck and a lapse in concentration. “We gave up a real unfortunate goal towards the end of the game, and I think that shell-shocked us a little bit,” said Onalfo. “We had the better of the game and we walked away not winning. Sometimes the game is very cruel, and tonight was a perfect example of that.”