Recap: D.C. United devastated in 4-1 loss to Ben Olsen’s Houston Dynamo
D.C. United lost 4-1 to Ben Olsen’s Houston Dynamo in a scorching Saturday night matchup at Buzzard Point. The Black-and-Red faithful will not be breathing a sigh of relief any time soon as D.C.’s winless streak continues and the roster grows thinner.
The night started out on a high note—for long-time Black-and-Red supporters, anyway.
Ben Olsen returned to Audi Field for the first time since his 2020 departure. A beloved figure at the club for over two decades, Olsen spent a little more than half that time in Black-and-Red, helping the club secure MLS Cup Championships in 1999 and 2004 before going on to be United’s head coach from 2010-2020.
Olsen wasn’t the only D.C. legend in the house on Saturday night. Jaime Moreno, Marco Etcheverry, and Bill Hamid met fans inside Heineken Hall before the match and were recognized on the pitch for their incredible contributions to the club.
As the match kicked off on the hottest day of the year so far, there was no inkling of the chaos waiting to ensue. D.C. United and Houston Dynamo struggled to convert opportunities for much of the first half, the humidity or simply exhaustion from a three-match week seeming to weigh the teams down.
Houston had the better of the chances in the first half. Erik Sviatchenko, Artur, and Ibrahim Aliyu all had shots on frame, but they didn’t serve up anything Tyler Miller couldn’t handle. For D.C. United’s account, homegrown Ted Ku-DiPietro had a solid opportunity in the 6′ thwarted by Steve Clark.
The Black-and-Red’s breakthrough came when Artur fouled Christian Benteke in the box as he and Jacob Murrell tried to work through Houston’s defense. Benteke stepped up and scored D.C.’s lone goal of the match, easily converting a penalty kick in the 38′ by firing a rocket past Steve Clark.
A nasty dust-up during stoppage time saw Garrison Tubbs leave the field with a suspected concussion. Matai Akinmboni took his place in the 45′ + 3′ as D.C. used a concussion substitution.
D.C. United headed to the locker room up 1-0 at the half. The stadium was buzzing with positive energy, and the Black-and-Red seemed poised to try and fulfill Troy Lesesne’s pre-match acknowledgment that “we just have to go out and make sure that we capitalize on the opportunities we create and limit the opponent as much as possible.”
Unfortunately, the second half would wreak havoc on D.C.’s best intentions.
An accidental handball from Matai Akinmboni in the 50′ gave Olsen’s Dynamo all the opening they needed to turn the match in their favor. Sebastián Ferreira slotted his penalty kick right past Tyler Miller to find the equalizer in the 51′.
Suffice it to say, Ferreira wasn’t done after the converted penalty. He fired another shot through heavy traffic to put Houston in the lead in the 54′.
Down by only one goal, the Black-and-Red could have easily made up the difference with a half hour to spare. All hope went out the window as Benteke collided with Houston defender Griffin Dorsey and was issued a caution by official Timothy Ford in the 66′. Benteke had heated words for Ford that were immediately met with red.
As D.C. played on with ten men, an emboldened Houston took advantage of the momentum of Ferreira’s brace to bring the pressure down on D.C. United. In the 86′, Ferreira capitalized on a cross from Brad Smith to turn his brace into a hat trick, all but sealing the deal for the Dynamo.
As if the pain of playing with ten men and down two goals wasn’t enough for the Black-and-Red, Ford added ten (yes, ten) minutes of stoppage time to the match.
Akinmboni was booked with another yellow in the 90′ + 4′ and ejected from the match. While Black-and-Red supporters had long since given up on salvaging a result against Houston, the reality of having Benteke and Akinmboni unavailable for the upcoming game against the New York Red Bulls was infuriating.
Houston was thorough, scoring a final goal in stoppage time to leave no doubt as to who should claim all three points. Gabe Segal, who entered the match as a sub for Ferreira in the 89′, tipped in a shot in the 90′ + 5′ from the center of the box.
D.C. United suffered through five more minutes of stoppage time before Ford’s whistle mercifully blew, closing out the match.
Head coach Troy Lesesne pulled no punches post-match, saying, “The result’s not good enough, clearly. I mean, this is a bad performance from us tonight.”
The Black-and-Red will need to dig deep and make significant changes before they hit the road to take on New York Red Bulls on June 29.
Watch the highlights from D.C. United vs. Houston Dynamo
Box Score
MLS Regular Season – Week 22
D.C. United: 1 Benteke 38′ PK
Houston Dynamo: 4 Ferreira (51′ PK, 54′, 86′), Segal 90′ + 5′
Lineups
D.C. United: Tyler Miller, Cristian Dájome (Pedro Santos 83′), Garrison Tubbs (Matai Akinmboni 45’+3′), Lucas Bartlett, Aaron Herrera, Martin Rodríguez, Mateusz Klich (Gabriel Pirani 74′), Matti Peltola, Ted Ku-DiPietro Jacob Murrell (Jared Stroud 75′), Christian Benteke
Houston Dynamo: Steve Clark, Daniel Steres, Griffin Dorsey (Brad Smith 81′), Erik Sviatchenko, Micael dos Santos, Artur, Amine Bassi (Sebastian Kowalczyk 74′), Latif Blessing (Brooklyn Raines 74′), Hector Herrera (Tate Schmitt 90’+10′), Ibrahim Aliyu (Franco Escobar 81′), Sebastian Ferreira (Gabe Segal 89′)
Misconduct Summary
D.C. United: Murrell 25′, Akinmboni (50′, 90′ + 4′ Red Card), Benteke (66′, 66′ Red Card), Dájome 73′, Bartlett 79′
Houston Dynamo: Steres 90′ + 9′
So, looking ahead to next year… Mackay makes decisions on Benteke and Klich. Then we may want to have back (in no particular order):
Most of whom should be at most competing for, not handed, starting jobs… I’d suggest Herrera is the only one that feels like a comfortable lock to start next season from that group.
That’s it, right? I mean, sure, we can have Fletcher and/or Hopkins* hanging around on the fringes trying to break into the squad, they’re young and cheap. Otherwise
The point being, even if we retain both DPs and everyone gets as healthy as they can, our total assets on hand sum up to a 14 man roster in terms of “people who might be useful for an MLS team with any competitive intentions.” Of whom three (Canouse, Antley, McVey) are out with significant injury/health issues. Schnegg might make it 15. I assume Badji is a band-aid… of course Kasper would pay him $750k on a three year deal to be a backup, but presumably Mackay knows better than that.
Miles to go before we sleep. 🙁
* I don’t mean to harsh on Hopkins here, it’s just that I haven’t seen any evidence that he can keep up with the pace of play physically or mentally, and if we had a real roster he wouldn’t yet have a start this year. Instead we’re so shorthanded that he has 12.
I mostly agree with this breakdown. I think there’s really big decisions to be made about Benteke and Klich. They’ve both had really good-to-great years, and exercising their options and retaining them as DPs certainly makes some sense based on performance. But they’ll be another year older, and it’s a bit of a gamble. Benteke is an elite aerial talent, but he kind of locks in the way you play. Klich composes the midfield, but he’s not really an elite chance creator (though he gets plenty of assists) or goalscorer. Do you roll the dice and try to upgrade one or both of those spots? Do you hurry up the transition to whatever comes next after this season by saying thank you for your service? At the beginning of this year, I was firmly in that camp, but both have earned the right to return if they wish. Ideally, you’d sign Klich to a new TAM deal, but who knows if he’d want that.
I think that Canouse is in a similar boat. He’d be nice to have back, but I believe his contract is up at the end of this year. He’s making a bunch, and who knows what his performance level will be like after missing this year. Maybe it’s better because he’ll have dealt with his colitis, but who knows. I think there’s a very good chance we’ve seen the last of Russell in black and red.
Likewise, I think at least one of the keepers is gone. Bono and Miller are both fine, but neither one is markedly better than the other, and Miller makes about four times as much money as Bono does. I think they try to re-sign Bono and say thanks for everything to Miller.
Birnbaum will be back. He signed a very timely new deal that keeps him here through 2025. The only way he’s not is if he decides this knee thing is just too bad, and he retires. Pirani is also here through 2025 (with options for 2026 and 2027). I think we’re probably just eating that deal, unless something massively clicks with him.
I’m very anxious to see what kind of deal Badji signed. If it’s just through this season with an option for next year, then good. If his green card is still valid, then very good. If it’s for less than $300,000, then outstanding. I sort of suspect that none of those things may be true, though.
I’m happy to have Murrell, Hopkins, and Fletcher back next year. They’re all still young, and may yet come good. Hopkins massively underperformed last year, and Murrell and Fletcher are not looking like much this year, but if anything, we’ve seen that we need bodies. I’m not entirely ready to write them off.
This window, United needs to sign two more U-22 players. The only benefit to having Peltola be a Young DP (other than roster cap consideration) is being able to maximize the talented young players we can also sign in addition to him. Right now, we only have one and that’s Pirani. Now, if the reported roster rules change, and teams can have three U-22 players regardless of their DP situation, I’ll also accept signing one U-22 and moving Peltola from a Young DP to a U-22, which would then free us up to sign another DP of any type.
Looking to the end of the season, Santos, Dajome, and Rodriguez should all be gone, and they’re all on really big salaries (especially Dajome and Rodriguez). They’ve given some real service to the club, but I think we should be able to upgrade all those spots for the cost. As I said, I think Canouse and Miller will probably be gone too, and potentially Benteke and/or Klich.
This team is in a thorough rebuilding process right now. They’ve cleaned out basically every bit of old wood they could, and the rest (besides Birnbaum and Pirani, and maybe Badji) should be gone by the beginning of next season. That’s all very much to the good. Mackay has added some good players, but he needs to add many, many more, and of even better quality. He’ll have that opportunity starting in the summer window and especially in the winter.
At least Olsen shouldn’t have had any issues finding the right bench since the away bench this year is the same as the home bench from prior years.
We probably could’ve used like 5 or 6 more guys like Antley at the start of the season if we were so worried about the budget. I feel like we’ll get as close as any teams ever gotten to not having any field players on the bench some the transfer window.
Surprised no one has mentioned the absolutely horrible officiating in that game. Maybe it didn’t come across on TV but at the stadium, you could see Houston players getting away with horrible fouls and DCU players penalized for sometimes hard-to-see fouls. Worst officiating I’ve seen in an MLS game and that’s saying something.