Monday, August 24, 2009

Previous Saturday's steam evaporates in Southern California - Chivas 2 TFC 0

Yuck. You stay up late on a Saturday night to watch the team play in Los Angeles and wish you hadn't bothered. I am detecting a trend. I was on vacation for the victory in San Jose, so I admit that my trend is selective. The last time TFC looked this bad to my eyes on a Saturday night was on the road in Utah against Real Salt Lake. The schedule is going to provide a steady diet of west coast Saturday nights. Seattle, Colorado and the Galaxy are the next three road games. If stinking in the Pacific time zone continues, squeaking into the playoffs will turn from a maybe to a longshot. What annoys me is that the GOL TV pregame show had interviews with the likes of Cronin and Robinson talking about aiming for the top two spots in the East, rather than qualifying for the playoffs as a wildcard team. Talking about aiming high is fine, but the performance on the field does not match the words at this point.

Chivas was a team that was riding high when they arrived in Toronto back in the spring. TFC beat them 1-0 and looked strong doing so. Months later Chivas has been in a slump and Toronto, rather than taking advantage, makes them look good. Sacha Kljestan has been a bust for 2009 and proceeds to score two. What playoff prospects...

Amado Guevara has a poor game and TFC has no attack in the midfield worth talking about.

The first Chivas goal was another example of Toronto frozen defending.

Toronto needs to toughen up. The MLS has it's share of cry-baby prima donnas that will feign injury to draw a foul. Carl Robinson seems to encounter them constantly. Trouble is Carl wastes his energy pointing out to the ref that the screaming player down is more Hollywood than injured. The attitude should be "if you think he's hurt now, wait for the miracle recovery and then the next three Toronto players who truly hit him will make you wish you had earplugs".
Dobson and Forrest waste time on this too, "oh Serioux better be careful, if he picks up a yellow he misses the next game, Brennan is already out blah blah". Give me a break, TFC is losing on the road AGAIN. Are the announcers going to go into the dressing room and give out lollipops to all the players who did not pick up a yellow card? Just send the message that simulation against Toronto leads to real pain and let the yellow cards fly. Serioux and Brennan should keep making life miserable for all opposing fancy dans. They should not hold back, instead the question should be why do we never see yellow in the vicinity of Attakora, Wynne, Cronin, Gomez, Vitti, Garcia? Do they tolerate losing more than Serioux, Brennan and Robinson? It is a team sport, you win together and you lose together. Get together in the tough moments and maybe your survival chances will improve. Rant over.

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