Rod

D.C. United hosted its annual "Meet the Team Day" on Sunday afternoon at RFK. Like every good, decent, upstanding parent in the country, I dragged my two-year old to walk around in 100 degree weather on the field to interact with people she doesn't know. And the bizarre thing is, it went well. Set aside for a moment that Ben Olsen may have thought that my daughter was about to pass out from dehydration (and how even making that conclusion possible reflects on me as a father), my little girl insisted on staying at the event and eventually got into handing the players a soccer ball she was carrying around from LAYSA fundraiser and getting autographs. The club, as always, did a tremendous job. The players were in good spirits, free ice cream and other distractions were available to the kids, and my daughter is even more excited about heading to RFK because of the experiences she's had at the stadium. This is, for me, the best event of the season and although I recognize it sucks for the players, it is one of the reasons that I will make sure to budget for season tickets every season.

Another great thing about the day -- for me -- is the team's sale of used kits. I own an excessively stupid amount of match worn shirts (is there anyone else in the U.S. who owns more the a half dozen Stranraer FC shirts? if so, buddy, you got problems) and the opportunity to add to my collection is always too much to pass up. Do I have any objective need for a Gonzalo Martinez or Tiyi Shipalane shirt? No. Do I own them anyway? Yes. But I am also incredibly embarrassed by this collection and try, as much as possible, to go through the inventory as discretely as possible which always means I buy too much of shirts that I cannot even defend procuring. On Sunday, two guys next to me were flipping through shirts while I tried to go through some of them on one corner of the table and one of the guys says to his friend "Look, it's a Rod Dyachenko... you have to buy this jersey... you hated this guy... he was your all time least favorite player." His friend responded with an icy glare and, with that reaction elicited, the Dyachenko shirt was thrown back into the pile. Cue me... "Are you going to buy that?" "What, this shirt?" "Yes." "No, man, no" "Ok, thanks."

Fast forward four hours. A storm has blown the transformer on the power line outside of our house, trees have come down throughout the neighborhood, and our power has been cut (and would not return until a few hours ago). Left with little to do in a dark house other than clean up after the storm, my daughter suggests that we "go soccer game." A treacherous hour long commute from College Park to Rockville follows (and gives full evidence to the widespread damage of the storm) and we are at Richard Montgomery High School watching Real Maryland take on Charleston.

And who is that on the field with Charleston's Mike Zaher -- DC United alum -- wearing number 12 for Real Maryland?



I'll admit that I ranted about Dyachenko's performances in a DC United shirt while sitting in RFK, but I also was always conscious of the fact that much of his poor performances could be chalked up to the way Soehn used him and gave him far more responsibility than he could perhaps handle. Rod has skills. He shows them in flashes during games -- in Sunday's match, it was a high pass that he took off his chest with his back to the goal from 24 yards out and, in the same motion, dropped it to a shot on his right foot that sailed over the crossbar. But he is also a frustrating player and that was also very much in evidence in the game.

Still, I am, oddly perhaps, looking forward to seeing how he fits with the team the rest of the season. The game was played in beautiful conditions and what we saw was a much better game than what we traveled to the Soccerplex to watch the previous day.

Although if I was under any illusion that Real Maryland had the best stadium situation of the three local professional teams, that notion was disabused by stadium officials noting that young men had snuck into the locker room during a previous game and stole the wallets and personal possessions of Real Maryland's players. Its one thing to try and ply your professional trade on a high school football field; its another to have that point underscored by getting ripped off for what few dollars you have while plying your trade on a high school football field.

Requiem for a Franchise

Last Sunday, we took the whole family to watch DC United take on the LA Galaxy at RFK and, once again, heading downtown felt like an event. Although the result was disappointing, the atmosphere at the stadium was tremendous, capped off by the emergence of casual fans in our section (the type who asked us if there were any players on the field from the U.S. national team? and which one is Landon Donovan? and whatever happened to Freddy Adu?). Even with a late Sunday night start, our two-year old wanted to stay until after the final whistle. Our enjoyment was heightened by seeing Terps A.J. Delagarza, Omar Gonzalez, and Stephen King on the field. It does not seem that long ago that we were watching them play at Ludwig and each of three -- along with the injured Rodney Wallace -- have firmly established themselves as Major League Soccer players.

On the subject of the Terps, we continue to be blown away by the sheer number of quality players that come through that program. While following our adopted Northern Irish team's graceful bow out of the Europa League competition to Azerbaijan's Qarabagh this week, we were reminded that the U.S. U-20 national team that is currently in Northern Ireland preparing for the Milk Cup features two current Terps -- the very impressive Ethan White and Zac MacMath.

We could not go to the Pompey friendly with DCU tonight -- unfortunate, as the reports from friends who went in our stead made it sound like a spectacle that will not be matched anytime soon -- and I missed the U.S. Open Cup game on Wednesday, so I insisted on going to watch Crystal Palace take on AC St. Louis at the Soccerplex this afternoon in 100 degree heat. My daughter and I were probably the only people that wanted to be there. I like the team. I like the franchise. I want to support professional soccer in Baltimore. I feel lucky to have the opportunity to watch Mathew Mbuta play. But I cannot imagine that the club can survive much longer in its current state. There were less than, we thought, seventy people at the game this afternoon. No one seemed to want to be there, not the players, not the club's staff, not the stadium employees, not the players' wives and girlfriends, and not the youth team that was being recognized by the club. The whole thing was embarrassing... all the more so, because we estimated that there were over 100 people outside the stadium waiting to get in for the Washington Freedom game two hours early.

I've been a season ticket holder for CP Baltimore for three years now. I have tried to get friends to go with me to games, with some modest success in years past. I made a half-hearted attempt to recruit people today and, frankly, I am glad that I failed. No one at the club has ever reached out to me -- we've never been invited to take part in an event for season ticket holders and we've never even met any of the players (although the club did send us a CP soccer ball signed by this year's team, which was greatly appreciated). The team's move to Towson, its current plight, and the fact that today will probably mark the last game we attend saddens me, but, at the same time, I don't really feel like we were ever a part of the team. I was surprised to hear my wife wax nostalgic about the club today, as she recalled the joy of going to Annapolis and watching Crystal Palace surprise the Red Bulls. With a Charlton alum anchoring the backline, and personalities like Shin Harada, Val Teixeira, and Mbuta on the squad, we felt like we lucked into something at the ground floor. Alas.

While that slips away, our ties with Real Maryland have grown stronger. In addition to having season tickets, we've sponsored the team commercially and the club has kindly participated in supporting an awesome charity in DC that works with kids. The staff has always been friendly and has gone out of its way, at every game, to make sure that they appreciate our custom. In contrast to CP Baltimore, our expectations for Real Maryland were pretty low. We largely went initially because of the number of DC United alums in the roster. Now, I think my daughter looks forward to going to the games that we can make at Richard Montgomery and that she'll enjoy going tomorrow night after meeting D.C. United's players earlier in the day. Not expected, but as long as she enjoys it and I get to take in a footie, I am not one to complain.

Najbulous

Whatever deficiencies might arise from the lack of a stadium of our own, all of that falls away come game time.

Walking up an escalator from the Stadium-Armory Metro Station last night, I was struck by how excited I was for the event and the intense surge of emotion at the anticipation for what was to come. I have had the same feeling over and over again in my life -- most often walking from the L station to Wrigley, but also when hopping off the tube to go to The Valley and ambling towards any number of stadiums around the world. But it dawned on me that I do not feel like this about any other DC-area sports team; the same excitement is not elicited by CP Baltimore or Real Maryland or the UMd or the Wizards or Nats or Mystics or, even, the Hoyas. I go to those games because I love sports and enjoy taking in the spectacle of a competition. I have come to love United and to welcome it into a part of me that is prepared to die a little bit with every loss and disappointment, just for the false promise of some glorious success over the horizon. Charlton won me over easily and quickly, but my feelings about United have developed gradually over time and have, I believe, largely been the product of the efforts of the incredible men and women that work in the club's front office. They have endeavored, consistently and without fail, to make my family feel welcome at RFK such that each of us feels a deep connection to the team and its fortunes.

The walk from metro station to stadium gate is long enough to ponder such self-involved piffles, with the walk from turnstile to seat allowing for contemplation of the number of beers I planned on consuming (answer: as many as possible as it was very hot and humid) and Mario Vargas Llosa's writing regarding the 1982 World Cup in Spain -- in particular his essay penned before the opening match between Argentina and Belgium. In that piece, the Peruvian batted back a theory pressed by a Brazilian intellectual who argued that the world loved soccer because it presented the world as it should be, a place where effort, talent, and skill were rewarded within the framework of universally agreed upon rules that were uniformly enforced rather than continuously corrupted. Llosa argued that people sat in the stands not because of a pining for an ideal world that would never be possible in our day-to-day lives but, instead, that what brought them out was the simple desire to have fun.

Having read the essay on the metro ride over, I puzzled over why I found his take unpersuasive, but the answer, of course, is clear. As a supporter, watching a game is not fun. It is a gamble and last night, United fans lost. A beautiful performance on the pitch was wiped away by a lost ball by one of United's youngest yet most reliable players.

However, although I am a Cubs fan, I do not go to games because I am masochistic either. Whatever emptiness existed from the result and however pleased Sounders' fans were with another victory at RFK, United fans have two things that they do not: Andy Najar and Julius James. Forget points and standings and playoffs, at this moment in time, Andy Najar is, on his own, worth the price of admission. What he did on the pitch last night was ridiculous and just watching the fear that a 17-year old kid strikes in seasoned professionals made it worth sitting through a match where we saw the beer man once in 90 minutes.

And then there is Julius James. In two games now, James has neutralized potent attackers from the Sounders (Montero) and Red Bulls (Angel) and has developed into the strongest, most confident center half that I have ever seen play in a United shirt.

European Tour

Lots of reasons to care about soccer outside of the World Cup today -- although the Germany-Uruguay consolation tie was entertaining. Charlton opened up their preseason friendly schedule with a two goal loss to AFC Wimbledon. DC United takes on the Red Bulls tonight in Harrison, as we get ready for the introduction of some new blood while the club continues to improve its play.

Watching Diego Forlan put in another great performance today was a nice reminder that European cup competition has begun. Most of the world isn't going to care about the initial stages -- none of it will come close to Forlan's exquisite showing against Fulham in the Europa League final. Still, Champions League play officially kicked off at the end of June (with the ridiculous storyline of Andorra's champions -- FC Santa Coloma -- being decreed to be 3-0 losers to Malta's Birkirkara FC for failing to be able to offer a playable pitch) and the second qualifying round kicks off this week. Bohemians FC drew the Welsh champions, The New Saints, and will host the first leg at Dalymount Tuesday.

Northern Ireland's champions, Linfield, did not enjoy a favorable draw and will have to take on Norway's Rosenborg BK. They will be decided underdogs in the matchup, but all things are possible and Rosenborg exited the Europa League competition last year in the second round to Azerbaijan's FK Qarabag Agdam. Qarabag went on an incredible run in the Europa League last year, knocking out Rosenborg, then beating Finland's FC Honka in the third qualifying round before losing to Steve McClaren's FC Twente Dutch side in the fourth round.

This year, we will be paying particular attention to Qarabag's Europa League exploits as they have drawn Northern Ireland's Portadown FC in the second round. Portadown qualified for the Europa League by making the domestic cup final, although the club lost to Linfield. The club has had a miserable record in European play; prior to this season they had lost 21 matches, drew another five, and won only two. Portadown had not won a game in European competition since 1974, when the club beat Iceland's Valur Reykjavik two to one. That woeful record has been improved, however, this season, with a 1-1 home draw against Latvia's Skonto FC and a glorious 1-0 away win over Skonto in Riga. Both of Portadown's goals were scored by Richard Lecky, one of three Portadown players we sponsored last season. Portadown will host Qarabag at Shamrock park on Thursday and then will travel to Baku to take on the non-Baku situated Azerbaijani side a week later.

A small contingent of folks in College Park, Maryland will be paying attention to developments at Shamrock on Thursday. Best of luck and here's hoping that everyone associated with the club enjoys the experience for as long as it lasts.

A Home of Our Own

Earlier today, season ticket holders received the following letter by electronic mail from Crystal Palace Baltimore's President Pete Medd:

Dear Season Ticket Holder,

First and foremost, I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your support of our club. Our season ticket holders have, and continue to be the backbone of our organization.

As many of you already know, our relationship with UMBC has ended and we will no longer be playing our home fixtures on their campus. We had hoped that our relationship with the university would continue for this season and indeed for the next, but many factors dictated our need to move into a new home.

With this in mind, we are pleased to announce that we have a new home for the remainder of the 2010 season. We will be playing our home fixtures at the Paul Angelo Russo Stadium on the Calvert Hall campus. Moving into Towson is great for the organization and the convenient location of a fairly new stadium will make the viewing experience for our fans that much better.

Unfortunately, as the turf has to be replaced before we can move into our new digs, we will be playing our next four games at the Maryland SoccerPlex in Germantown. It is an incredible soccer-specific facility that plays host to the WPS Washington Freedom and DC United’s US Open Cup games. If we are to have a temporary home, we might as well make it a comfortable one.

We look forward to having you aboard with us at Crystal Palace Baltimore as we move forward in this new chapter in our history.

Yours,

Pete Medd
President, Crystal Palace Baltimore

Once the club moves to Towson, it will probably mark the end of our attendance of CP Baltimore games, but we might be able to swing going to the SoccerPlex for the next four matches, so it temporarily works out.

But the e-mail from the team drives home something that should be extremely disconcerting to any soccer fan in the DC-Baltimore metropolitan area. We have three professional clubs in the region and the team with arguably the best stadium situation is the third division team, Real Maryland, which plays on a high school football field. The club plays at a stadium sized for its crowd and near mass transportation. Richard Montgomery High School, for all of its flaws, has become a venue that we look forward to taking our daughter to for a game. UMBC, in contrast, was generally miserable -- an experience underscored by a game last season played while fans were attacked by angry hornets. Our allegiances, accordingly, shifted and we are now three times more likely to attend a Real Maryland game than a CP Baltimore fixture.

Things with DC United are better, insofar as RFK is located on the blue/orange line and I've never been attacked by stinging/biting insects at the stadium. But the field situation is clearly not sustainable. The upper bowl is rarely populated and when we've gone to Open Cup matches there, the 2,000 attendees posed in relief against 50,000 empty seats detracts substantially from the game.

It simply cannot be that difficult to build a soccer-specific stadium in a region that is crazy about the sport. I've been by the new Red Bulls stadium in Harrison a couple of times in the past year and I am unabashedly jealous of what their supporters have been given. Yesterday, I insisted on taking a detour from sightseeing to go to the Stade Saputo in Montreal and came away even more embarrassed by what we lack. The soccer specific stadium is magnificent:







The Montreal Impact also have a practice field next door (we saw players running in and out of the administrative offices when we visited):



When I told one of the staff members how we didn't have anything like this in Baltimore, she responded that "Oui, we are very proud of the stadium" and described with reverence the July 2009 visit of the Girondins to the stadium. Nearly 12,000 showed up for that match at the Stade Saputo (which, a week later, was followed up with a visit from River Plate). Nothing similar would appear to even be possible for CP Baltimore and I would imagine that even when DC United is able to entice AC Milan (or, for that matter, Pompey) to RFK, there is some embarrassment about the grounds.

Nevertheless, there seems to be little hope in the near term for a stadium anywhere in the region. There is no good reason for the lack of will to make a stadium a reality and at this point, if DC United is forced to move to Baltimore just to be able to have a home of their own, I would not object.

And just one minor note: if you are running for county council in Prince George's and want my support, with support meaning not only my vote, but an eager volunteer and campaign contributor, tell me that you will go to war for a stadium in our jurisdiction. Tell me, and my neighbors, that you recognize how important a soccer stadium would be for the diverse citizenry of your county and how such a stadium would have social relevance well beyond anything that FedEx Field could possibly offer or what U.S. Airways Arena could ever have hoped to achieve. In other words, Al Whiting, tell me that you are not Eric Olson.

Dear Mr. Gulati:

After writing a derivative and unimaginative postmortem of the USMNT experience in the 2010 World Cup that provided the ages of various players, I am happy to pen yet another pointless piece about the national team.

As part of my month of soccer book reading, I am working my way through Brad Friedel's "Thinking Outside the Box." As Paul Kimmage observed in The Times two years ago, if you can get over the ponderous start to the book, it is a worthwhile read. Friedel is a thoughtful and relatively candid storyteller and the book reads as a rather clinical study of how to approach a career as a professional. He neither sugarcoats the mundane details of the work required to be at the top of his game nor does he attribute his achievements to divine providence.

Of particular interest at the moment is Friedel's thoughts on former teammate and manager Mark Hughes. Friedel appears to have a large amount of respect for Hughes. He contrasts Hughes with his predecessor at Rovers, Graeme Souness, by deeming Sparky an "improver" and Souness an "importer." Friedel argues that Hughes' tenure as the head coach of Wales taught him the need to get the most out of the players in the squad and emphasizes the changes that Hughes brought to Blackburn (like the introduction of ProZone and other regular, routine metrics for evaluating performance and development).

The thought of Hughes as a potential candidate for the USMNT gaffer position would seem ridiculous -- it is a far cry from the resources he had available at Manchester City and a remarkable distance from the English Premier League -- but Hughes' current dalliance with the Dubai club Al Ahli would seem to indicate that such a job might not be terribly unattractive. I doubt that anyone in the U.S. Soccer Federation would seriously entertain even approaching Mark Hughes for the position (there is a far better chance of BB keeping the job than Hughes being recruited), but I would at least hope that he is considered as a possible option. Under Hughes, Blackburn performed better than the talent on the team would have forecasted. Hughes has previously expressed an interest in returning to "international management" albeit with England and at a more advanced age and he is therefore clearly not ignorant of the demands of national team coaching.

Hughes' time with Man City is not terribly informative of any shortcomings he has as a coach, insofar as his reign coincided with a tumultuous era at the club with heightened expectations and a lot of overpaid dead weight on the roster. However, Hughes has been criticized as tactically deficient and too committed to a management staff of familiar friends (the Welsh mafia). But these concerns are muted a bit by the deficiencies of other realistic candidates that may be available. They could be further mitigated by the introduction of Friedel -- tipped to be a future football coach himself -- as part of the coaching staff.

Start Again

I was excused from the heartbreak of having to watch Ghana's upset of the United States yesterday afternoon by the visit of good friends from overseas. I had intended to watch both games later in the evening, but had those plans foiled by stopping by J. Paul's in the Inner Harbor for a late lunch. I was reasonably certain that the United States would lose the match -- as much as I have enjoyed watching them this tournament, I was still surprised to see the USMNT advance out of the group stage with a gaffer who insists on making poor tactical and lineup decisions. Craig Stouffer's post-match autopsy is, I believe, spot on: Bradley never got out of his own way and it cost the United States the best opportunity that its earned to reach the semifinals in its history.

But that should not detract from how enjoyable the team was to watch. Nor does it take away from how much many of the USMNT players developed under Bradley. The individual talent on display has been remarkable. The issue now squarely confronting the USSF is how to proceed forward. This was likely the last World Cup competition for Steve Cherundolo (31), Carlos Bocanegra (31), Jay DeMerit (30), and Marcus Hahnemann (38). Cherundolo, Bocanegra, and DeMerit all played well and I hope that DeMerit will get a serious look from an EPL team to anchor someone's line next season.

It is possible that Howard (31), Donovan (28), Dempsey (27), Onyewu (28), and Beasley (28) might be in the mix for any team that qualifies to travel to Brazil -- the oldest outfield players were 31 for this team -- but the team is going to have to find new anchors. At 22, Michael Bradley was, by a significant margin, the best player in the U.S. side. Altidore, 20, developed into a good big target man, who laid the ball off well (although inconsistently) to teammates. More work on finishing, more confidence, and more repetition against the world's best and perhaps he is what we have all been waiting for in a clinical striker. Feilhaber (25), Edu (24), and Holden (24), may continue to develop and will likely be important pieces going towards qualification, but most eyes will be on M. Bradley's fellow 22-year old midfielder, Jose Torres. The US team was undone when Rico Clark (27) lost the ball in the midfield early on and the turnover highlighted the sublime skill that Torres offered in his limited opportunity (when he was stupidly asked to play a more defensive role), where the ball stuck to his foot and he showed possession capabilities beyond anything currently on offer in the team. And then there is Alejandro Bedoya -- at 23 -- and Charlie Davies -- at 24 -- who both provide more creative promise to a side the suffered to pull anything out of Robbie Findley (24), who did not merit a starting role in two World Cup matches.

The biggest concern facing Bob Bradley's replacement (there is no reason to allow Bradley have another cycle) is the team's backline. Jonathan Spector (24) should have gotten more time when the decision was made to bench Onyewu, but BB went with the underwhelming other Jonathan, Bornstein (25). Edgar Castillo (23) will presumably get a fair shot under a new regime, Silver Spring's Kevin Alston (22) will get a look at right back, and Marvell Wynne (24) will hopefully develop further. But while the fullbacks may be ok, the immediate question for the new coach is who plays in the center? Omar Gonzalez (21) is a stud and should anchor the backline. Will Chad Marshall (25) improve enough to warrant playing alongside Gonzalez? Will Brandon McDonald (24) and Michael Orozco (24) remain part of the mix?

Whatever happens, the talent pool continues to deepen, and an improvement in coaching would coincide with an improvement in capability.