Rapids Get Good Road Point, Saved Something For LA

As I was saying:

1-1 draw, goal by Torres.  This is a tough one to call, long flight, short rest, but RBNY hasn't been setting the world on fire either.  If Pablo really does focus on just this game I think we can get a result.

Colorado went cross-country to the only undefeated team in the league on short rest and walked out with a point.  Its a good result and in a vacuum its a great result.  Given our season so far though a win would have  been really helpful and midway through the second half it seems that the decision was made to take the point and rest for LA on Saturday instead of press for the win.  Was it the right call?  I guess we'll have to see how the season goes.

General impressions:

• Pretty sad that the team's announcers have to look at the RBNY feed to see a lat minute lineup change from the Rapids.  somebody should be able to feed them that info (or hey, actually send them to the game) before they see it simultaneously with the fans.
• O'Neill only made the bench because of the late scratch of Moor.  It seems odd that a U-23 regular and possible National Teamer can't make the bench while the USL callup gets the start at RB.
• I now know why we sold Brown, because the cloned him into Badji before we sold him.  Badji had 2-3 great chances and didn't finish.
• Powers did most of the work with a great FK but Torres did just enough to get the goal.  That's a goal in 3 of the last 4 games for Gaby.
• The PK was bad by Newnam.  That was a clear PK when he let Sasha K get goal side of him.
• Newnam also almost had an own goal in this one.  Rough introduction to MLS.
• There was a 5-10 minute period early in the second half where Sam was just living in the seam between Sjoberg and Harington.  I was surprised RBNY didn't score.
• Bringing Cronin in for Torres and Eloundou in for Badji felt like we were compressing and accepting the draw instead of going for the win.  A reasonable move in a vacuum but we let so many chances to win go already this season so it kind of hurt to see.
• There were two non-calls in this game that have some fans feeling like we got screwed.  The first was the take down of Badji just outside the box right before half.  Unfortunately Badji's inexperience cost us.  Instead of just going down on contact he took a step and collapsed.  Geiger, a ref who handled a knockout round game in last year's World Cup, wasn't going to buy the dive.
• Then late in the second half Eloundou went down in the box.  To me it was a good defensive play.  The NY defender poked the ball first before going shoulder-to-shoulder with Eloundou.  We've seen less called for a PK in MLS but I have no objection to not calling it.
• Sjoberg had a good night, getting in the way of a number of dangerous chances.
• LaBrocca returned to his normal depth player level after a good game on Friday.
• The PK is the first goal we've allowed on the road.
• After going scoreless in our first 4 games we've score in our last 4, but our record is only 1-2-1 and we've only scored more than 1 goal once.  Baby steps I guess.
• Torres now has 3 goals, nobody else on the team has more than 1.  Powers noww has 4 assists, nobody else on the team has more than 1.  Torres and Powers are our offense right now (they each have 1 assist and goal respectively as well).
• The lack of a finisher on this team is criminal.  We have to hope Wolves lose this weekend and Doyle becomes available to us earlier because it doesn't look like the FO is going to fix t he problem otherwise,

Man of the Match: Juan Ramirez.  He was quick, took on the defense, and moved the ball into good locations.  He needs to work on his shooting but he's showing why he was worth the young DP designation.