Saturday, June 2, 2007

TFC 2 Colorado Rapids 1

It was a special day for TFC mostly because it should not have been special at all.
TFC was facing a MLS team (Colorado Rapids) that has had a strong start to their season. The Rapids have a reputation of an efficient not flashy team that does enough to win.
TFC’s number one goalkeeper, the man who has played every minute of TFC history, was off on national team duties.
Although the starting 11 only had Carl Robinson missing, the bench was certainly weakened by those national team duties with the Gold Cup
Plus there was the freaky omen that Conor Casey, a player traded off to the Rapids more than a month ago, had his mug shot prominently on the TFC ticket today.

Well it just shows to go you.

Team reputations can rise and fall with a flash and the Rapids did not look strong or efficient in the first half. TFC took the momentum away from the visitors and could have had a much bigger lead going into halftime. Wynne set up Dichio for the opening goal. I love it when Marvell Wynne leaps into the attack. O'Brien's corner set-up Boyen's header for the second.
Keeper Greg Sutton missing? No problem. Except for one flash of an attack against the run of play that resulted in the Colorado goal, Srdjan Djekanovic was a capable replacement.
So much for a depleted bench – both Gala and Canizalez played useful minutes in their second half appearances.
Chris Pozniak played an active game in the central midfield role usually patrolled by Carl Robinson.
As for the ticket possible jinx, Casey looked like a poor man’s Dichio. Don’t think there is one fan out there regretting the trade.
This TFC team is building nicely. It is yet another challenge ahead with NY Red Bulls coming in on Wednesday. Jeff Cunningham has more work to do to earn the love of the TFC faithful. If his goal scoring record with TFC starts against NY it will start the turning things in his direction.
Best Banner today was the one that had Cunningham and Dicho drawn beautifully and between them was the title.
"The Fast and The Furious".

Blogger observations- (understanding that the difference between a blogger and a sportswriter is that a blogger can throw in stupid, self referential extras)
Sunblock was required today and should be distributed upon entry at all summer games. I think I left with my skin as red as my shirt.
Food consumed today
A cornbread sandwich
BBQ bratwurst on a bun
California roll sushi
Ben and Jerry’s Cookie Dough ice cream stick
Orange popsicle
(give me a break, game started at 3:30 and partner and I realized upon entry that we had yet to eat- it was a busy day and it was hot and humid)
Liquids consumed
A Nestea Iced Tea
A small but delicious Carlsberg
2 bottles of water- they need to be refillable and bigger

3 comments:

Unknown said...

BTW
I did not see what prompted the Goldthwaite Red Card.
I did see Jeff Cunningham get shoved down more than once.
I think TFC were getting pretty upset about the manhandling the Colorado defense were getting away with and that may have lead to a heated arguement ??

Anonymous said...

TORONTO FC DEFENDER KEVIN GOLDTHWAITE

On his interpretation of the sending off:
"(Nicolas) Hernandez and I were arguing back and forth ... he's coming back at me in Spanish, I'm going back at him in English. And what I say gets picked up by the referee, the referee hears it and therefore I get a straight red for what I said, which you know wasn't the nicest thing to say, but that stuff happens every game."

Anonymous said...

Did anyone aside from the ref actually see Goldthwaite commit his sin? Not even the TV coverage had it!

Radzinski still hasn't signed anywhere, wouldn't he look good in red? The offence looks pretty good now, just how scary could we be with him?