Spirit win, USMNT roster announced, and more: Veterans Day Freedom Kicks
Happy Monday everyone, and a Happy Veterans Day to all of those out there who have served this country through our military. We thank you for your service, sending a special shoutout to those in our Commentariat who are veterans.
I’m traveling home from a wedding, so these will be short:
Recap: Washington Spirit Advances to NWSL Semifinals After Extra Time Goal (Spirit)
Yes!! The Spirit win over Bay FC 2-1 after extra time and will host Gotham FC in the semifinals. That match will be on Saturday at 12:00pm ET at Audi Field, so let’s continue to make Audi rowdy!
U.S. Soccer releases November roster for crucial Concacaf Nations League quarterfinals (SSFC)
The USMNT have two crucial matches coming up this week against Jamaica, and the 25-man roster was released yesterday. Mostly familiar names on this list.
Messi, Inter Miami crash out of MLS playoffs in 3-2 loss to Atlanta United (PSW)
Oh boy…Inter Miami lose to Atlanta United and are out of the MLS Cup Playoffs. The 9 seed take out the team with the most regular season points in MLS history…what’s next for Inter Miami?
D.C. United begins rebuilding its goalkeeper corps by acquiring Jordan Farr (WaPo)
DC United finally have a goalkeeper, grabbing Tampa Bay Rowdies goalkeeper Jordan Farr.
Rúben Amorim facing delay with Man Utd start (ESPN)
Ruben Amorim might have a delay with his visa paperwork and it could prevent him from starting with Manchester United after the international break.
Enjoy the day, everyone.
Julian Gressel didn’t see any minutes in any of the three Miami playoff games. We also have a decent amount of cap room right now and have probably the most dominant aerial threat in MLS history…..
If Mackay decides he wants to go win now and we can get a decent deal done then it would be really tempting to try and get him again. But I also highly doubt Gressel would want to come back to DC.
Eh, I could see a reunion. Money talks, new regime, and he probably would rather feel useful then glued to the bench. Is it likely? Not at all. The new FO seems dead set on completely staying over. It’s probably better for our budget, we have a ton of holes to fill.
His ability to serve up quality balls into the box would be a huge piece for Benteke.
I know there’s a fair amount of people around here that don’t share this opinion, but I’d rather have Lucho Acosta back. He was making some noise about having played his last game for Cincinnati. Now, they just extended his contract last year, and it seems unlikely they would deal him to a conference rival – if they chose to send him anywhere else in MLS at all – but he would make a better fit for DC, in my opinion. I’d be happy to have Gressel back, but Aaron Herrera has done a pretty excellent job filling that role. Gressel could play more of a straight right winger, or possibly a CM, but Lucho fills more of a hole, in my mind. He also is more of a scoring threat than Gressel.
Now, the scuttlebutt is that Lucho was cheating around on his wife, and they she took their kids back with her to Argentina over the summer. And there are a bunch of comments from Cincinnati fans about how he was making gestures at teammates and sulking around, sentiments that will be familiar to the DC fanbase. But he was an MVP last year, had similar numbers this year, and his biggest gripe was not having a true #9 this season. I for one would be happy to have him back in Black and Red, but I realize that is mostly a pipe dream.
As I have said in the past, Lucho tends to be his own worst enemy. If Cinci wants to be done with him, I would imagine Houston makes more sense, if Lucho and Benito are ok with being reunited, that is. For some reason, I don’t think Lucho’s ego would mix well with Benteke or Klich.
Having seen almost all DC United and Washington Spirit matches at Buzzard Point since it opened in mid-2018, Sunday’s attendance (19,215) was the biggest actual butts-in-seats crowd I’ve ever seen. (DC United grosses up ite announced attendance by “tickets sold” vs actual fans on hand.)
Michele Kang has the right strategy: offer seats at reasonably affordable prices. (My Spirit season ticket costs less than half DCU’s for the same seat). Jason Levien opts to soak deeper pocketed fans for as much as he can get. (The much-touted Blue Halo Lounge is the latest example.)
And I can count on Michele Kang to always put on a first-class show. (The Morgan State Band yesterday was top-notch halftime entertainment.)
By contrast, I offer you this year’s Africa Cup. Not only was there no printed program but the stadium announcer couldn’t even identify any of the DCU academy players or Ghanaian professionals by name. The message: you fans don’t count as long as we can soak you for $70 as part of your season ticket. It was disgraceful.
I know for a lot of these preseason and exhibition games, there’s a policy to not identify any players that aren’t actually signed by the club. So you see things like Trialist 1, or Academy Player 1. I have no idea if this extends to in-stadium announcing, but it wouldn’t surprise me.
As far as the Ghanaian players, it’s my understanding that they had to cobble a team as best as they could right before the match (not sure if DCU logistics played a role in that or not), so looking through my most charitable lens, the announcer just might not have been able to get an actual roster in time. But yeah, that Africa Cup was just put together poorly from the jump.
The Africa Cup, the Capital Cup before it. Just a stupid conceived bid to catch some season ticketholders napping and stick them with the ticket charge. No one with any interest in these matches. To be honest, if they had friendlies there between national teams or maybe top Mexican club (not involving DC United), I’d be more interested.
Having vented about Kang v Levien, some comments about yesterday’s match.
Spirit did a great job defensively, allowing Bay FC only ten shots (two on goal). Oshoana and Kundananji are beasts — fast and very strong. Yet Morgan, McKeown, Krueger, Hershfelt, and Rodman muscled right up to them. One sustained muscle-off between Kundananji and Rodman drew a huge crowd cheer. Bay’s goal came from one of those damnable corner kick melee’s
Kudos to Trinity Rodman who was regularly beaten upon by Bay and clearly hurting most of the match. Yet she sucked it up and delivered key moments on offense and defense for 120 minutes. Here’s to a restful not quite a week until the semi-final.
It’s really extraordinary how the Spirit have gutted out these last weeks of the season missing their (and NWSL) assist leader Croix Bethune, top-scorer Ouleymata Sarr, Trinity Rodman for several late matches, and now top defender Andi Sullivan. Great team spirit and great coaching.