Friday, July 17, 2009

British-led Rapids Try To Burn DC

The British didn't burn Washington until August of 1814, but late July is close enough for my purposes. Once again the Rapids are facing the same team twice within a month, this time its the squawking crows of DC. Back in late June we beat them at the Dick 3-0, now we have to head East and repeat the feat. Game time is 6pm MDT (Same time as the USA-Panama game of course) and as always the supporters groups will be gathering at the British Bulldog.

Official Injury Report:
PROBABLE: MF Nick LaBrocca (L hamstring strain)

Official Discipline Report:
SUSPENDED: Ugo Ihemelu (Caution Accumulation)
ONE CAUTION FROM SUSPENSION: Conor Casey
TWO CAUTIONS FROM SUSPENSION: Mehdi Ballouchy, Scott Palguta

International Absences:
Colin Clark (U.S. National Team)

DC is missing Quaranta and Jakovic to the Gold Cup and Barklage to injury. New signing Danny Szetela is still dealing with some personal issues involved in the change of teams as well, plus they are one man short of a full roster. So both teams are dealing with some depth issues. My guess on the lineup:

Pickens
Kimura - Gibbs - Palguta - Harvey
Mastroeni
Cooke - Ballouchy - LaBrocca
Casey - Noonan

If LaBrocca can't go I assume Peterson would take his spot. Julian Buadet is eligible to play his first league game, but I'm guessing he'll come off the bench while Smith works him into the squad. There's been no official announcement of Jamie Smith or Facundo Diz being signed, so I'm assuming they won't be available yet.

Key To Look For:

Defensive cohesiveness. There's been a good deal of rotation on the defense over the last couple of weeks, but they did manage to get a shutout against a toothless Dallas team last week. DC is tied with Seattle for the highest scoring team in the league so we're going to need the back line to work as a team to have a chance int his game.

Prediction: 2-1 loss goal by Omar Cummings. The Rapids have historically struggled in DC over the years, and the way we've been playing over the last month I don't expect that to change. Our defense hasn't shown the ability to shutdown a rested strong offense so I expect DC to get at least 2. I don't see how our offense can keep up with them.

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