As a season ticket holder you get a few perks. A special line to go through, discounts at the merchandise store from time to time and this year we got the opportunity to watch the game from a skybox. When first presented with this opportunity I was fairly iffy on it, I like being amongst fans who are cheering and yelling at the refs (like myself) and didn’t know what it would be like up in a skybox. On the plus side the offer came with free food and non-alcoholic beverages. So after dithering for a few days, my wife and I decided what the heck. We had never seen a game from a skybox before, so why not.
Iit was like watching the game in someone else’s living room that you didn’t know that well. You couldn’t always tell who had the ball (well except for Larentowicz and Wells Thompson and it wasn’t easy to pick out what was happening when a lot of bodies were around the ball. In addition, we had the Comcast Revs broadcast on several T.V. and there was an 8 or 9 second lag, so you would see something on the field and then here it described in the background several seconds later.
During halftime Matt Reis came up to visit and he was very cordial to everyone – especially the kids that were there. If getting autographs appealed to me that would have been a great perk. All in all, I much prefer watching from my seats in section 106.
As for the game itself, I was already worried about facing a midfield combo of Mastroeni and Larentowicz and when the starting lineup was announced with no Sharlie Joseph, I had a sinking feeling. As the game played out it became clear that our midfield couldn’t handle theirs. Still, we had some chances early on but a chance that went begging led to a Rapids Goal. Dube missed yet another gift wrapped scoring opportunity and the Raped hit on a counterattack with Ballouchy hitting a bouncer past Burpo that I think he should have done better with. Shortly after that Nyassi won a free kick and Perovic hit a marvelous free kick into the upper right hand corner that the Rapids goalie could do nothing with.
Dube had another golden opportunity towards the end of the half but hit a harmless header to the goalie. The Revs again had chances in the second half but could put nothing away. Colorado got a goal off a great holdup play by Casey who managed to bring down a ball with Gibbs or Barnes draped all over him (I couldn’t tell from the skybox) and laid off a perfect pass to Mastroeni that he blasted into the net. After that it was all over but the shouting.
So what’s next for the Rev’s? One thing is clear – without Joseph, the combination of Niouky and Phelan is not the answer. Me – I favor putting Perovic in Joseph’s role and playing either Tierney or Mansally on the left side. We will see what Nicol comes up with in tonight’s game.
