Donovan Ricketts sucks. Aside from being named after a disease he is a pretty piss poor imitation of a goalkeeper and by far my least favorite player in MLS. I hate his flowery goal keeping style, where everything is done not for efficiency but for the cameras, and people fall for it. Time and time again he makes the nominations for save of the week when typically he has turned a routine save into something entirely more flamboyant.

If he actually had Rickets he might be a better player.

And this is the totally of  my pre-game analysis.

I understand that with the minuscule MLS squad sizes that competing in multiple competitions can be tough. I understand that the guys just fought through a hard game just a few days ago. I understand that the race for the MLS Cup is the priority.  I understand that we have a huge test this weekend when we meet the Seattle Sounders in our first road game. I believe that the Wizard’s fan base as a whole will be quite disappointed that our sojourn into the US Open Cup is at an end before it really began.  I believe that that which separates teams that win, from those that lose is founded it a culture of competing and winning no matter the game or the platform.

I am going to just shoot from the hip and see where this goes.

I went to this mornings training session at Swope Park and watched half the ‘reserve’ squad get run into the ground in one of the more intense sessions I have seen since I have been going.  Espinoza, Smith, Jewsbury, Kostrov, Hirsig and Besler all took a beating in the spring heat.  Meanwhile a Arnaud, Kamara, Auvrey and some others obviously fingered for duty in tonight’s game completed a training session so light and so free of anything real that it basically might as well have not happened.  I left upbeat, I am not naive, I knew that we would not be fielding a full strength team but figured with the talent that was idly finishing up while the ‘reserves’ were working hard we would field a team that would take the game tonight by the horns and simply win it.

We didn’t, we opted to field a weak starting eleven lacking that failed to make up in effort what they lacked in guile and creativity.  Craig Rocastle was the stand out player of the night but the while the remainder of the starting eleven huffed and puffed around him they failed to create much and the Wizards 5th minute goal, while attractive, was more luck and bad goalkeeping than anything else.  Teal Bunbury, charging down the left wing cut inside and then crossed the ball (badly) towards the goal.  The cross evaded the completely awful Steward Ceus in goal for Colorado and landed in the net triggering rampant celebrations from the Wizards fans and comical “rookie of the year” chants.

The Cauldron celebrating teals goal. They were in fine voice all night.

This was the high point and I believe the only effort the Wizards managed on target all night. only a few minutes into the game and the Rapids began to dominate the play.  Standing on the 18 yard line with my camera felt like a bad call throughout the game as the action was simply at the other end of the field and the Rapids deservedly tied things up in 24th minute.

The Wizards brought Michael Harrington and Kei Kamara into the game at the half, replacing the tireless and somewhat impressive Korede Aiyegbusi and the anonymous Sunil Chhetri.  Chhetri, out of sync and ideas early in the game suffered from an abundant lack of service  and wound up dropping ever deeper for the ball.  Once in midfield he became entirely ineffective and did little more than chase shadows to finish out the half.  Without service into the area he will not score goals and this is one area the Wizards completely failed in tonight.  With Kamara and Harrington on the overall quality of possession improved and when Stephane Auvray was introduced things looked to be swinging back towards the Wizards however a with the clock running down Wells Thompson scored his second of the evening and whatever momentum the Wizards had was lost.

Kamara had a late chance to level things up but his header was always heading over the bar irrespective of Ceus touching it.

Guess we will try again in 2011.

A lot of people talked about a potential run in the US Open Cup for the Wizards this year based upon the strength of squad that we have.  We have some very obvious starters like Arnaud, Smith, Besler, Auvrey and Nielsen however with the exception of Smith I believe that each has somebody else in the squad capable of doing their job if they need to.  Hirsig for example seems to be complete retooled to cover for Arnaud this season, we have the somewhat hapless Escobar available if Besler goes down.  Rocastle or Diop can cover any holes left by Auvrey and Jewsbury.  These reserve players are competent and while they might not be quite the players they are replacing they would be able to get the job done provided we do not use them all at the same time.  The idea of depth in a squad is that these players step up as needed to supplement the first team – not to replace it.  The philosophy for the USOC with the Wizards over the last nth seasons however seems to be to fling a squad together the protect the first team from unnecessary burden in a minor competition.

Is it really beyond a measure of sanity to throw in a few more starters to give us a chance of winning these games?

I am not calling for a full on starting eleven but our starting lineup of Eric Kronberg, Jonathan Leathers, Jimmy Conrad, Pablo Escobar, Korede Aiyegbusi, Chance Myers, Graham Zusi, Craig Rocastle, Sunil Chhetri, Teal Bunbury, Josh Wolff was simply lacking.  Josh doesn’t score without service, and apparently Chhetri does not do much without it all.  Starting Arnaud, Auvrey and Kamara at the beginning would have probably made all the difference in the world yet instead we simply handed the momentum away and then tried to bring in the guns to turn things around.  Soccer does not work this way, momentum is often everything and once things start sliding downhill it is hard to get them to stop.

</rant off>

Player notes.

Josh Wolff worked impressively hard again and was often the best player on the park through the game.  He fluffed a chance … but even Wayne Rooney can do that, it is hard to hold it against him.  The service was poor enough that Sunil Chhetri and Wolff managed maybe one shot between them during the game.   Chhetri didn’t look like he is quite used to competing for the ball, he certainly made himself available but he also didn’t put in half the work of Wolff during the same period.  He might have to man up a bit when he does not have service.  Ironically this was the same criticism I would have had of Wolff last year but he fought well tonight as he has done all season.

Sunil Chhetri – in the strip, seldom on the ball …

Craig Rocastle is clearly quality and those within earshot of me will attest to me being a bit of a fan of his ability to quietly hold possession, win the ball and make good simple passes.  Finally the fan base got to see some of what he has to offer tonight and I’m thinking he earned a few extra fans.   Pablo Escobar ….. ack.

Claudio Lopez back in KC.  One game, one assist.

Seattle are next.  We’ll find out how good we really are on the road.

Before the DC United game on opening day there was a tour of the stadium site.  I’m not sure if anybody else posted pictures – maybe Thad over at www.backpost.net (edit — he did, and his as usual are better than mine.) but looking through my stack of memory cards I came across a couple.  Keep in mind that these are now more than two weeks old. If you stop by the site in a couple of weeks for the LA Galaxy game things will have progressed mightily.  The final picture is a quick snap from last weekend.  The Wizards were good enough to host a steel signing ceremony where season ticket holders got to scrawl notes, names and anything else that came to mind on the very first girder to be raised at the site.

Think about scale – look at the vehicle sizes compared to the structure.

One of the things I was looking forward coming into this game was learning more about the 2010 Wizards.  I wanted to see how they fared when under pressure, how they would do when things got physical, how Roger Espinoza and Harrington would do in their wing back roles when faces with a real offense.  I wanted to see how our defense looked period and I wanted to see what would happen now that the game tape on Ryan Smith is out and his bag of tricks is no longer a surprise.  The good news is that the answer is well on almost all counts.

I will not go as far as to say that we ‘Bossed’ the Colorado Rapids tonight.  We didn’t – at the back end of the first half the game could have easily gone either way.  The first half saw Roger Espinoza under pressure and struggling to link up with Smith which stifled our attacking game.  This was all very predictable, cut the supply off to Smith and you take him out of the game and it is a tactic we will see all season long.

Colorado also brought a physicality to the first half that was intense to say the least and succeeded in pushing the Wizards out of their plan of attack and the pretty patterns we wove against DC United quickly became disjointed play and bred a certain amount of frustration for the players.  The game was certainly a tight affair and throughout the first half Kamara who really struggled on the wing early on often alternated with Smith as the two wingers switched sides in an attempt to free things up.

It became evident against a better class of opposition than DC United can ever hope to be that the Wizards were going to have to grind out a win and that a solitary goal would probably settle the game either way.   Change came in the second half as Vermes pushed Kamara into a forward position and moved the impressively hard working and under appreciated Wolff onto the right wing.  I never thought I would see the day where Wolff was winning tackles in defense for the Wizards.  He might not score a ton this season, but the effort he has shown over the last two games proves that he has a bit more to offer than I thought he did and I am not afraid  to give him props.

The reward was almost instant as Kamara rose to power a beautifully flighted Ryan Smith free kick into the back of the net just after the break.  The stage was set for the second half and the Wizards continued to press.  Julien Baudet was (harshly) red carded for a clumsy tackle in the 71st minute and the Wizards were able to simply maintain possession and run the clock out for the remainder of the game.

Colorado was a test, the first real test of the season.  The woeful DC United appear to be the new MLS whipping boys and our 4-0 victory over the last week was almost a gimmie in hindsight.  Colorado are at the other end of the spectrum, a quality team who worked hard throughout and I found myself checking the clock frequently as the game played out to see how much longer we needed to hold out for.  A much improved second half performance from the Wizards made this a much deserved win.

Some thoughts …

As much as I like Kamara’s pace I am not sure I like him on the wing.  His service is not that great and he really doesn’t beat people.  He has a motor and can keep going but I think his pace as a forward is far more scary than his wing play.

Our defense looked a lot stronger than I thought it would based on what I had seen so far, I thought they did rather well.  The real test comes against Fredy Montero and Freddie Ljungberg next weekend when the Wizards meet a side that can truly counter attack.

The Red card issued against Julien Baudet seemed to be a yellow at best.  In the context of the game and everything that happened it was harsh.

How different do you think this starting eleven will be on Tuesday against Colorado in the US Open Cup?  If I had my way – I would keep the same lineup but this seems unlikely.  We will find out much about the intentions of the Wizard’s in terms of the USOC based on who starts.

I’m a pretty average guy, the things that make me happy are simple things.  I enjoy watching sport, I love watching soccer, I live to guy to live events.  I enjoy my wife and kid, I like Deadwood and the Sopranos and I like it when Megan Fox runs.   Something changed over the post season, with a newborn at home and a wife who is an RN and works nights the tendency to get ‘locked in’ was huge and getting out was something I did when I could.  I started to look forward to the new season like I normally look forward to that first wonderful spring day when you can feel the sun on your back.  Yup, the new season, a chance to get out of the house where I also work in between baby sitting and washing diapers.  A chance to watch my Wizards stink again.  Joy …… I even started to miss Community America Ballpark, started to miss the lame Cauldron songs I have spent time lambasting in the past.

News of a trialist called Ryan Smith set me off — it was the hair that broke the camels back and turned me from casual fan, to some kind of psychotic manic obsessive Wizards zealot.  The kind of guy with a blog, the kind of guy who knows what is going on all the time.  The kind of guy who goes to training with a camera.   The kind of guy that wants to take all the fan based Wizard’s content online and meld them into one spot so that we might actually have a resource more valuable than the official pap we get now.  Between a fair, blue eyed angel called Charlotte and a skinny Englishman who reminds me of Mookie I have been driven right back into my old Arsenal fan boy days.

It went something like this ….

Robb Heineman Tweets -  left sided player now in camp, Ryan Smith, former Arsenal player.

Big Soccer Person in response to the Tweet – “I like that he’s young. Doesn’t look like he’s ever seen much game time though. Is this just a trialist or is this the left side English guy we signed and didn’t have the name on yet?”

Big Soccer Person – “In 82 career games, he’s scored a grand total of 1 goal.  Seems about right for the quality of overseas talent we usually bring in. Reminds me of Marinelli.”

Moi : “Don’t be to down on Ryan Smith – the kid has more talent than about anybody on our roster and at one time was seen as one of top prospects in English football. He came through with Cesc Fabregas and made his debut in the game and trained alongside Denis Bergkamp. He is fast, and when confident full of tricks. The goal scoring stats mean nothing here, this guy is a winger, tricky with scary good ball control when he is on and an ability to run at people and create.

He has played for some dreadful teams, and something has obviously gone wrong for him but there is a real diamond in the rough if the Wizards can develop him. If Arsene failed can Vermes? A question for the ages, but then I think MLS might suit his style more. Beyond the Premier League the English game is rough, and hard and the I’m not sure that ever suited Ryan. Intelligent player, able to beat people …

Check him out … I think he can still be a winner. ”

This was met with almost no response aside from one particularly douchey post about Marinelli from a guy speaking from the abundant knowledge he had gleaned from two minutes on You Tube … watching a video I posted.   Watching the thread is kinda funny, I go on to cheerlead Smith and win a few people over before the team comes back to Kansas City to finish training and others get to witness what I have been prattling on about since early February.   The tide turns, people share my excitement, people talk to me about Ryan Smith, I am recognized as making a good call and I suddenly get very very very nervous because my head is about as stuck out as a head can be.

Suffice to say I enjoyed the 4-0 hammering of DC United.  I can’t remember feeling that level of relief before over an individual performance.  I took pure joy in everything Smith did and he did everything I expected him to do.  He made chances, he beat people, he was an absolute fucking revelation (to most).  So I cheered, clapped, enjoyed the game and got home and read Mike Kuhn’s solid match report.  I looked at Thad Bell’s pictures.  I thought about how to capture that first wonderful game and realized there was nothing I could say or do that would do it justice.

I was late to the party.  Everybody was talking about Smith and the Wizards – I wanted to say something real, something original.  I had a ton of stuff written for the last pre-season week to intro Smith, Auvrey and a couple of others and had been frustrated when I was asked through the grape vine to not talk about the team, formations or the players in to much detail.  I held my work, and all of sudden the Wizards 4-0 romp ruined it all.  All of a sudden me telling the world once more than Smith was going to be amazing was yesterdays news … the remainder of the MLS news people had finally cottoned onto the idea that KC might actually have a team and we climbed from the basement in the (meaningless) power rankings to *gasp* to lofty heights.  I leaned a lesson or two about this game …

Two weeks later, on the eve of another game I have realized that to do this and enjoy it I need to say what I have to say first.  So I can take my inflated ego, and my know it all attitude to this game (I am seldom wrong), and just lightly revel in the fact that I write about what I know and I do not guess, I don’t speculate, I don’t re-post every lame rumor that is posted somewhere else.  Press Creds are supposed to be coming my way tomorrow.  I will be picking them up, keeping my camera in my car for another game and enjoying from my normal vantage point in the Cauldron, over the coming 3-4 months I will find out if I enjoy writing about the games more than watching them.  I’ll find out if I have enough steam to keep going, and next time anybody asks me to hold back … I will very politely ask them to fuck off.

I think that was me explaining a two week absence.  Either way … big week coming.  I’ll be signing, photographing and videoing some crap at the stadium site tomorrow.   We will find out if Harrington and Espinoza can actually play right and left back under pressure as the Wizards host Colorado and on Tuesday we will do it all again as the Wizards and Colorado meet in the US Open Cup.  Claudio Lopez is back … for Colorado and has his P1 Visa and will be able to play.  The big question is will he?