Recap of the D.C. United Revolution game

photo courtesy of the New England Revolution website.

Blake here,

New England has started off the season pretty brightly given the injuries they have been coping with. Last night’s game against was the third different starting lineup in four games. The game started well for D.C. with Ben Olsen forcing two saves from Knighton in the first 20 minutes. In the 20^th minute the Revs should have gotten a penalty kick when DC United player Namoff clearly intentionally handles the ball in the box. I don’t know where the referee, Jair Murrufo, was but the call was obvious on the first go-around and more so on the replays. Announcer John Harkes tried to cover for his old teammate, but there could be no doubt. Two more bad calls from the ref follow and the half ends 0-0.

The second half started better for the Revs. In the 50^th minute Ralston crosses the ball off a throw-in to the back side post where Joseph headed it in for the 1-0 lead. Murrufo continued to make curious calls and miss obvious ones. At one point two D.C. United players collided and he called a foul against New England. Later Emilio threw Heaps down on a D.C. United corner kick and no call was made. Hand balls in the box and throwing people down are apparently not fouls. I missed that when I took my ref classes but that was a few years ago so perhaps the rules have changed.

Late in the game (injury time) with D.C. pressing for the goal, Fred (a second half substitute) has the ball in the corner by the Revs goal, shadowed by Nyassi. Fred flops and Murrufo makes the call. I had a feeling that was going to cost the Revs and sure enough Jaime Moreno hit a great free kick towards the back post where Ben Olsen made a great effort to get to it and head it into the goal off of Phelan. I give full credit to Moreno and Olsen. It was a great play. But the opportunity that gave rise to it shouldn’t have been given at all.

Perhaps I am mistaken, but it does not seem like the refereeing in MLS is getting better and in fact it sees to be getting worse. As the Revs weren’t playing last week, I satisfied my MLS fix by watching the Chivas/LA Galaxy game in which the ref gave out 3 red cards and 7 or 8 yellows. One of the red cards was off a second yellow on an obvious dive by Landon Donovan. (Is he taking diving lessons from Christiano Renaldo?) And in the game against D.C. United Murrufo makes 2 bad calls which effect the outcome of the game directly - the non-call on the obvious hand ball in the box and the phantom foul on the Revs that lead to a goal. Ah, but as they say, that is part of the game.

At the end of the day the Revs were outplayed in the first half and D.C. was outplayed in the second half. The draw was a fair result all-in-all.

A couple of final thoughts: Without the efforts of Knighton (who was man-of-the-match for me) the Revs are down at least a goal going into halftime. Barnes was again a tower of strength in the backline and I though Igwe had one of the best games I have seen him play. I hope that Wells Thompson develops a better sense of timing, I like his defensive work, and his dribbling has improved but when he goes forward he is still making one dribble too many and losing the ball. As a Revs fan I am very happy Sharlie Joseph is still with the team, but how can he not be in Europe. He is ready for that next challenge. Another Rev that is ready for the next challenge is Larentowicz who just keeps getting better. Lastly (and I think I speak for all Revs fans here) I hope that Twellman is able to come back soon at his usual form. It is clear that the Revs don’t have an answer at the forward spot yet. Dube and Mansally have their moments, but neither seem to be able to get in scoring positions the way Twellman does.

That’s all for now.