Legacy Night loss shows DC United’s legacy needs serious repair
DC United’s struggles continued on Saturday night in a 4-2 loss to Austin FC before 17,474 at Audi Field. However, the story wasn’t the extension of an overall winless streak for the Black-and-Red which stretches back to May 31st or a home league winless streak that dates back to May 3rd. With nine matches remaining, DC United are firmly in 14th place out of 15 teams in the Eastern Conference. However, to many people, that isn’t the main thing that has been lost. On Legacy Night, a match meant to honor the tradition that serves as the foundation of the club, the result has added to the confirmation that many had weeks ago: the legacy of the club is in serious need of repair.
The night began with DC United’s pregame planting the flag ceremony, which is something they started this season. Four club legends – Marco Etcheverry, Jaime Moreno, Steven Birnbaum, and Luciano Emilio – planted the flag, returning to Audi Field to be honored as part of the evening. The team wore their Archive kits that were unveiled on July 16th for the first time before the home fans, and the team gave away 30th season pins to the first 5,000 in attendance. However, that was all you really saw about Legacy Night. There was no mention of the flag planting ceremony on social media, and despite the leadup to the match having various posts featuring some of the club’s legendary players, there was no mention of any of those legends during the match last night either online or in the stadium beyond the same four players being being reintroduced during halftime.
For a night that was supposed to focus on the legacy of the club, that legacy was very much viewed as an afterthought. The team’s call for fans to wear white to the match went largely unanswered outside of the fans in the supporters sections of 136 and 137. Even on the south concourse of the stadium, team gear was largely absent on the backs of the fans in attendance. Anecdotally, on a full concourse at halftime, about 500 people were in some sort of soccer jersey on the southern end of the stadium, opposite the supporters end. Less than 20 of them were DC United jerseys. Diehard fans of DC United have been replaced by casual fans of the game of soccer, and the DC United jerseys that used to dominate every match are no longer the prevalent jersey of choice for attending fans.
Fans are frustrated at the team’s recent performance, with calls of “Sell the team” raining down from the supporters end just before halftime. However, with 10 minutes remaining in the second half, as scores of fans filed out of Audi Field early, the “Sell the team” chants spread to the entire stadium, the frustration boiling over.
And, the players are frustrated too. Still, they know that all they can do is continue to work hard and hope the results will come. “[The] team does a good job of coming in on on Tuesdays with a fresh mindset and just trying to build again throughout the week and get better at the things that we’re trying to implement in in games,” a visibly frustrated Derek Dodson said after the match. “We got to move on, learn from this event and come in Tuesday for a good training session and push again for a result.”
“You just got to keep going to work every day…getting back on the training ground and everyone just keep understanding their role and their job within the process and keep going at it,” interim coach Kevin Flanagan said in the postgame press conference, clearly acknowledging the visible and audible frustration coming from the club’s supporters. “It’s a really tough moment for the club. It’s a really tough moment for players. You know, it’s just important that we’re all resilient throughout this moment and we keep showing up every day and going back to work.”
Still, while the players are working hard to try and right the ship, and the team getting a new head coach in René Weiler (who is expected to fully be onboarded in the next couple weeks), fan frustration and impatience have become outmatched by fan apathy towards a team that has not operated like the legacy that is the club’s foundation. Legacy Night didn’t go to any great lengths to reunite longtime fans with the winning past or educate new fans on the club’s successful history. There wasn’t a return of the players from 1996, 1997, 1999, or 2004, when DC United won their MLS Cups. There wasn’t anything during the match that sought to reintroduce the attending fans to the club’s historic past. As the clock wound towards second half stoppage time, fans streaming out of Audi Field was the visual. The supporters’ positive chants turned back to “Sell the team” chants and audibly voicing their frustrations with the club.
That foundation of legacy is in tatters now, and the club needs to begin the work to reconstruct it and renew the trust that it has lost with fans. That’s going to take longer than any one result on the field or any one olive branch the club extends off the field. It will require a massive effort to reclaim the identity of the club and rebuild on the tradition which established it. And the effort must be even greater to win back the diehard fans who have thrown up their hands in frustration and detachment.
There wasn’t any attempt to keep fans in it with an air of positivity at the outlook on the rest of the team. The fans who remained at Audi Field at the final whistle were not even treated to the postmatch fireworks which were said before the match to be occurring. The feeling around the club by many fans was one of grim resignation, and there aren’t any readily available answers on how to generate positive traction, either in the MLS standings or the DC soccer scene.
DC United will face the Ethiopian national team in a friendly next Saturday at Audi Field, but after that the team doesn’t return to Audi Field until August 23rd, when Inter Miami come to town. The stands will be dominated by fans hoping to see Lionel Messi visit the District for the first time since he arrived in MLS two years ago. And once again, DC United’s legacy will be under direct threat of vanishing more into the history books if they’re not able to turn in an inspired performance to give fans hope.
I am at a loss for words. The only thing I can say is “Ooof.”
Let’s be honest the Miami game is already a foregone conclusion as a loss.
With DC United not returning until the Aug. 23 match vs Inter Miami, our focus should be on the match the week before in Stade Saputo, as DCU and Montreal duke it out for the pole position in the Wooden Spoon race!
No doubt, MLS will decide to eliminate the MLS Superdraft before DC United can exercise the justly earned first pick.
Our pick has been ceded to Inter Miami for $5 TAM. MLS rule # 45-234.4
[…] Legacy Night loss shows DC United’s legacy needs serious repair (DP) […]
This is the hammer on the nail we all feel. Goff read bitterly on Sunday. DW2 reads bitterly, and accurately. My fiance’ and I are giving up. 4 games to go and not looking back. I even told Dave Kasper (nice guy, seriously) that I was packing it in. He had the look of gentle resignation.
Jason Levien is worth 280 million dollars, there is no excuse. If they want to fix this mess and get a dedicated, loyal president of football operations, I start at $500,000. A moron could fix this. So many inexplicable unforced errors abound. I am astonished how they can exceed my expectations.
1) I could not “upgrade” to the AV lounge with transferring my midfield seats to endline seats and pay for the privileage. My fiance’ managed to get permission from security to at least look inside. She found it laughable. Try club rooms at Ibrox or Celtic Park sometime. NOT EVEN CLOSE. (Second hand info, but I trust her).
2) I could not exchange banked tickets for the Miami game. I guess there is money to be had.
3) C5 is virtually empty. It used to be teaming with psycho DCU fans. No longer.
4) I am booking my flight to hang with the CEO of Celtic who graciously invited me to his box “anytime ye like, Bry”
5)This club should have had legends forever in our midst. Now they parade them in front of incompetence. Yet another inexplicable unforced error.
6) I see more of Dave Kasper than anyone in management. (reinforce: nice guy).
7) My ticket rep (great guy) bailed for NWSL.
Ethiopia awaits. I have transferred my tix to my future son in law who is going on a diplomatic mission there a week after the game. Kind of cool timing. He knows the ambassador, so maybe there will something more fun that usual involved. It will probably be Italian night, as a nod to Mussolini circa 1935, as this tone deaf unforced error club stumbles into its well deserved sunset.
How do I really feel? DW2 said it best. Solid posting my friend. I will, however, remain with District Press until my last breath.
Things like Legacy Night are a little harder in MLS, which seems to be placing less emphasis on it’s history and the original clubs. If the league doesn’t care about legacy and DCU’s present has been bleak, it’s hard to expect fans to get excited.
Winning cures all but the team needs to figure out how they envision doing this. It does not feel like they have a consistent on field or team building philosophy. They need to determine if they want to be a club that relies on homegrowns and they need to be smarter about their DP slots and how they use TAM. Sell Benteke so he can play for a team with a chance at winning and focus on the future.