2007 MLS Week 19 Recap or Never Count Dallas Out
This week was a wonderful one for home teams as every one won, although at least one of them needed a lot of help from the visitors (yes I'm looking at you Colorado). Three of the four weekend matches were good meetings with the Lamar Hunt clash in Dallas being the most thrilling. One little bit of interest, with the exception of Houston, the teams with the better records won each game meaning the league table is a little less condensed then it was.
Anyway, here is the league by numbers 122 games into the season:
* Number of MLS matches with Beckham in attendance
I have added a category for games involving Beckham just as a comparison. He plaid in two of the biggest stadiums in the league this week (although New England didn't open all the seats), so his average will not normally be so high (except when they hit New York).
Columbus Crew 2-3 FC Dallas
No Toja, no problem. Columbus dominated so much of the early play in this match that it looked like the Crew were the team fighting for the Supporters Shield, but Dallas kept finding their way back into it. Even going down a man was not enough to sink this club as Carlos Ruiz showed some long lost life while Clarence Goodson was everywhere. Nothing like a last second goal to win a match and maybe shake off the ghosts of August past.
Goals: CC: Marcos Gonzalez (1) 6', Andy Herron (3) pk 74'
FCD: Arturo Alvarez (2) 60', Carlos Ruiz (4) 80', Clarence Goodson (1) 92+'
Attendance: 14,818
Houston Dynamo 0-1 Colorado Rapids
Dwayne De Rosario took a number of shots on the night, too bad for him the only one he landed was one in his own net. The Rapids continue their miserable play with an occasional moment of something good from Herculez Gomez or Pablo Mastroeni, but for the most part, the Rapids deserved nothing from this game. Houston finds themselves suffering from the same problem that hit them early in the season, they can't make anything out of their many chances. There is something wrong with a club that can't get a goal against a 10-man Rapids side.
Goal: Own Goal Dwayne De Rosario
Attendance: 18,024
Toronto FC 0-3 Jozy Altidore, I mean NY Red Bulls
What a harsh return for Mo Johnson to Giants Stadium. His club is hurting and their horrible control of the ball showed it. The Bulls, meanwhile, were well rested and all healed up till Claudio Reyna went down in the 22'. But the story of the night was up top as Jozy Altidore and Juan Pablo Angel kept finding their way through a confused backline (Todd Dunivant as a central midfielder?) and gave New York a much needed win.
Goals: Juan Pablo Angel (1) 24', Jozy Altidore (4) 50', (5) 63'
Attendance: 12,103
Los Angeles Galaxy 0-1 New England Revolution
Another bad night for the Galaxy as they continue to look frustrated on the pitch. However, they actually had a few open breaks that resulted in some chances but they could not get them past Matt Reis. The Revs, fueled by the many balls they intercepted at midfield, kept putting the ball deep into LA's half, forcing the Galaxy to stay compact. Taylor Twellman made the most of this as he put himself into position to get goal time and time again. Sure enough, in the 55', he made it happen, sending LA home and near the point of no playoff chance.
Goal: Taylor Twellman (9) 55'
Attendance: 35,402
As expected, the playoff race changed a lot this week. This is how the first round would stack up if the season ended today:
New England - Columbus
FC Dallas - Chivas USA
Houston - Kansas City
DC United - New York
At the moment, LA sits in the 12th spot on 14pts, or 12pts off Columbus for the final playoff spot. So they need to win 4 of their next 5 matches to be even with the Crew. The good news for them is they play Colorado twice and Real Salt Lake once in their next 5 (they also play Chivas and NY), so they have a favorable schedule to make it happen.
Anyway, here is the league by numbers 122 games into the season:
| Season | Week 19 | |
| Attendance | 1,875,889 | 127,033 |
| Att per game | 15,376 | 25,407 |
| Beckham Att (3*) | 102,610 | 82,088 |
| Beckham Avg Att | 34,203 | 41,044 |
| Goals | 312 | 11 |
| Goals per game | 2.557 | 2.2 |
| Inter-conference | East 22-17-17 | East 2-1-0 |
| Visitors | 30-61-31 | 0-5-0 |
| Ties | 31 (25.4%) | 0 (0%) |
I have added a category for games involving Beckham just as a comparison. He plaid in two of the biggest stadiums in the league this week (although New England didn't open all the seats), so his average will not normally be so high (except when they hit New York).
Columbus Crew 2-3 FC Dallas
No Toja, no problem. Columbus dominated so much of the early play in this match that it looked like the Crew were the team fighting for the Supporters Shield, but Dallas kept finding their way back into it. Even going down a man was not enough to sink this club as Carlos Ruiz showed some long lost life while Clarence Goodson was everywhere. Nothing like a last second goal to win a match and maybe shake off the ghosts of August past.
Goals: CC: Marcos Gonzalez (1) 6', Andy Herron (3) pk 74'
FCD: Arturo Alvarez (2) 60', Carlos Ruiz (4) 80', Clarence Goodson (1) 92+'
Attendance: 14,818
Houston Dynamo 0-1 Colorado Rapids
Dwayne De Rosario took a number of shots on the night, too bad for him the only one he landed was one in his own net. The Rapids continue their miserable play with an occasional moment of something good from Herculez Gomez or Pablo Mastroeni, but for the most part, the Rapids deserved nothing from this game. Houston finds themselves suffering from the same problem that hit them early in the season, they can't make anything out of their many chances. There is something wrong with a club that can't get a goal against a 10-man Rapids side.
Goal: Own Goal Dwayne De Rosario
Attendance: 18,024
Toronto FC 0-3 Jozy Altidore, I mean NY Red Bulls
What a harsh return for Mo Johnson to Giants Stadium. His club is hurting and their horrible control of the ball showed it. The Bulls, meanwhile, were well rested and all healed up till Claudio Reyna went down in the 22'. But the story of the night was up top as Jozy Altidore and Juan Pablo Angel kept finding their way through a confused backline (Todd Dunivant as a central midfielder?) and gave New York a much needed win.
Goals: Juan Pablo Angel (1) 24', Jozy Altidore (4) 50', (5) 63'
Attendance: 12,103
Los Angeles Galaxy 0-1 New England Revolution
Another bad night for the Galaxy as they continue to look frustrated on the pitch. However, they actually had a few open breaks that resulted in some chances but they could not get them past Matt Reis. The Revs, fueled by the many balls they intercepted at midfield, kept putting the ball deep into LA's half, forcing the Galaxy to stay compact. Taylor Twellman made the most of this as he put himself into position to get goal time and time again. Sure enough, in the 55', he made it happen, sending LA home and near the point of no playoff chance.
Goal: Taylor Twellman (9) 55'
Attendance: 35,402
As expected, the playoff race changed a lot this week. This is how the first round would stack up if the season ended today:
New England - Columbus
FC Dallas - Chivas USA
Houston - Kansas City
DC United - New York
At the moment, LA sits in the 12th spot on 14pts, or 12pts off Columbus for the final playoff spot. So they need to win 4 of their next 5 matches to be even with the Crew. The good news for them is they play Colorado twice and Real Salt Lake once in their next 5 (they also play Chivas and NY), so they have a favorable schedule to make it happen.
Labels: 2007 MLS Recap, MLS
posted by Mike H at 11:56 AM
1 Comments:
Houston did nothing to deserve to loose their game and the Rapids did nothing to deserve to beat them. Did you see the press release CO put out about the game? Sheesh, they were so flat they only managed 4 _SHOTS_ the entire game. They're lucky Waibel didn't score.
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