Colorado Homegrowns Stand Up To Barca Miami

Well that was an interesting game.  Hard to call it fun when we didn't get the win, but at the same time I don't think anyone would complain about a draw all things considered.  The Rapids rolled out a lineup featuring 4 Rapids Academy homegrowns (Anderson, Bassett, Larraz, Vines) and brought another (Yapi) in off the bench.  Meanwhile Miami tried to coast through this game by leaving Messi and his friends on the bench, but realized at half they're not good enough to pull that off and brought the gang in.  In the end all the GOAT and the other Barca All-Stars could do is manage a 2-2 draw against the Colorado Kids.  Its only 1 point on the table but its one of the few "moral victories" that not just trying to make a failure look good.

That's not to say there aren't still issues with the Rapids.  4 shots on goal all game, 2 of which didn't happen until after we were down 2-1.  In fact the only shot in the whole first half was the penalty kick.  Given how Colorado bossed the game at times in the first half that's nowhere near good enough.  Once again we saw urgency from the team after going down, but we need that urgency from the start of the game.

The first half was, as mentioned, tilted in the Rapids' favor.  They arguably had a PK not called for them in the first 10 minutes.  There were also hints of a red card in that same period but on replay Cabral took a dive.  The only thing missing was the ability to shoot.  Cabral did earn the PK and Navarro finished it, but that was the total offensive output of the first half.

It was really just the 15 minutes after halftime when the team was obviously feeling the pressure of Messi that they slipped up.  And even then it took adding Busquets before Miami broke through.  I'm going to say that somehow Messi was unmarked in those 5 minutes, but there are many, many better teams who have left Messi unmarked for 5 critical minutes and paid for it.  Bad defense from the Rapids but not that surprising.

After taking Miami's best punch the Burgundy Boys got up off the mat and pushed the game back onto them.  We saw a bit of that "play in transition" on the tying goal as a quick counterattack caught Miami out of position.  Calvin Harris did a nice job sliding a pass to Bassett and he beat Busquets and Miami's keeper for the goal.  He later got Busquets' shirt as a reward (Navarro got Messi's).  Even near the end the Rapids had a shot to win with another free kick from DM, from almost the same spot as last week, but this time it was saved.

Again though, if you told Rapids fans (and if they're honest, probably Chris Armas and Padraig Smith too) that we would start 4 homegrowns and face down Messi for 45 minutes, along with Busquets and Alba, in Miami, and come out with a draw any of us would have taken it.  We need to take this momentum into San Jose (currently last place in the league) next week and get 3 points out of them.

Man of the Match;  Cole Bassett.  Yeah, the game-tying goal makes you MOTM>  He also is the only Rapid to have 2 shots on goal in the match.  Up until that goal though I was leaning heavily to Bombito, who was caught out on one of the Miami goals but otherwise played a really good game.