Yes, I don't like the Rapids. Sorry. I'm a RSL supporter. Often I don't watch the Rapids games even though they're all carried locally for us. Their announcers drive me nuts. However, once I saw the final score for this match, I was keen to hear what they had to say. The Rapids don't lose very often.
First off, the Colorado folks whined and bleated about Bruce Arena not telling anybody that he left Beckham in LA, so the Rapids wouldn't have time to adjust their game plan. Hey, sounds genius to me, and I'm hardly a Galaxy fan. Colorado looked really uncertain as to what they would encounter, and it turned into hesitancy and complacency on the pitch in the first half. It looked for all the world like LA was the home team. Jamie Smith was out for the Rapids, and they didn't deal well at all with attacks up their left (LA's right). This burned them in the 25th minute. LA sent a ball into the six that found it's way onto the foot of the Rapid's Drew Moor, who knocked into the net for an own goal, putting LA up 0-1.
It didn't get better for the rest of the first half. Juninho hit a long range bomb after coming off that flank in the 42nd minute that went into the back of the net. That gave LA the 0-2 lead heading into the break.
Colorado had some chances to make adjustments in the second half though. One thing they did was bring on Omar Cummings, his first game back after an ankle injury. He immediately injected life and confidence into the Colorado attack and they put the Galaxy back on their heels a little bit. They capitalized on the pressure in the 64th minute as Connor Casey slammed home a goal off of a Cummings rebound to make it 1-2. The Rapids were back in the match.
Then it all fell apart in the 74th minute. Folan went to ground to try and tackle Juninho, and brought his back foot into scissor him. Juninho went down and Folan received a Red Card, putting the Rapids down a man.
LA quickly capitalized. The momentum of the match swung instantly in their favor. They scored the last goal of the game in the 80th minute, when Chad Barrett slipped it by Pickens to make the final score 1-3.
Clearly the red card changed the game. However, looking back on it, it was totally deserved. Speaking of dirty tackles, Brian Mullan returns to the Rapids lineup next week. No, Z isn't back yet for Seattle.
No comments:
Post a Comment