Troy Perkins’ newest season with D.C. United is starting just like his last one. At least Perkins sure hopes so.
“It’s not the way it was written, of course not,” said Perkins after giving up his fifth and sixth goals of the year in United’s 2-0 loss to New England. “But let’s look back to 2007. We go 0-6, I think, and pretty similar to this, actually. We were on the road the first game. We were shocking, just couldn’t sort anything out. And then we went ten or 12 games unbeaten.”
(Before we get too revisionist, of course, United actually lost their first three games of that season before going unbeaten in nine of their next ten and eventually winning the Supporters’ Shield.)
But all United can do tonight is look at the fact that the Kenny Mansally and the Revolution handed them their first home-opening defeat since 2007 and in the process won at RFK during the regular season for the first time since 2006. All in front of a robust attendance of 20,664. The problem is, as patient as D.C. would like all those fans to be, it won’t be easy to keep them coming back unless the results turn quickly.
Three other thoughts:
1. Tonight was a stark reminder that the days of a golden triangle of supreme Latino attackers is gone. In its place, United has Jaime Moreno – who is utterly magical but simply shouldn’t play 90 minutes, ever – Chris Pontius – who needs to do as a good a job finishing as he does beating himself up for not finishing – and Santino Quaranta – whose adjustment to playing attacking midfielder apparently won’t be easy or quick.
“At times we’re trying to do too much, and I’m guilty of that, too,” said Pontius. “I need to pull the trigger faster, and we need to test goalkeepers more. Hopefully that will come.”
As for his golden chance off a driven Brandon Barklage cross just before halftime, Pontius said: “Of course, I should’ve scored it. I didn’t think it was going to get through, and once it did get through, a last-second reaction, put it over, and I know I should’ve done better with it.”
Quaranta was a kick save by Preston Burpo away from scoring in the first half, too, but his darting run that led to a shot in the second was more familiar than watching him try to orchestrate the D.C. offense.
“I’m used to making these runs from the outside, and when you play two in the middle, you have to pick and choose the times that you make runs because you don’t want to leave your guy by himself,” said Quaranta. “In the end, I’m an attacking player, and that’s what I do best, and I can’t forget that. So I’m going to stay trying to score… It is a little a different. In the end, whatever it takes to win. If I have no goals and no assists and we win every game, I’m happy. But in the end it just wasn’t good enough tonight.
2. D.C. head coach Curt Onalfo put a brave face on it, but he wasn’t happy about giving up a result after having the better of the play for the majority of the night. Stil, I’m going to lean on Perkins for a better initial evaluation of how United played.
“It’s really unfortunate,” said Onalfo. “I thought the crowd was unbelievable tonight. For me tonight, as my hope opener, seeing those spectators was amazing, and I really would’ve loved to have given them a win. But again, sometimes in life things don’t come easy, and it’s certainly not coming easy for us right now. But I believe in this group.”
“The first 20 minutes we were pinging the ball, one- or two-touch, guys were moving,” said Perkins. “Then we started slowing down off the ball. We weren’t making the runs. We weren’t moving just as much. We ran out of ideas, and then we were taking three or four touches, and now the whole game slows down. In that kind of situation, we’ve got to be better. We have to recognize that a little bit earlier. And then the second half, we came out a little bit flat. After the first 10-15 minutes, we were all over the place. Guys were running up the field when they shouldn’t have been, and we were very unorganized through the center of the park. We got stretched a lot and exposed.”
3. D.C. can’t help but be a little concerned about injuries. Onalfo said all three of his subs (Christian Castillo, Carey Talley and Brandon Barklage) were necessities due to injury. Castillo got a knock in a knee that has given him trouble, and Talley had his left knee wrapped afterward. Barklage should be fine, but he was a surprise departure given how productive he had been on the right side. The moves also made Onalfo keep Moreno in the game, thus denying him a chance to introduce Danny Allsopp, who might’ve given a spark offensively.
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