The Dynamo depleted and fatigued from the road fought valiantly with a make-shift lineup in Seattle in front of 30,000 fans.
After getting a great opening goal from Brad Davis who beat Kasey Keller with a blast to his left from 20 yards out the Dynamo despite some nervous moments had the edge in play in the first half and had good spells of possession.
Late in the half a controversial goal from Fredy Montero was allowed as referee Mark Geiger and his crew deemed a Montero touch cleared the entire goal line.
After watching replays it is hard to believe that the ball cleared the entire plane of the goal line despite not having the perfect camera angle. Reaction from Mike Chabala was dis-belief.
The 1-1 halftime score would turn into 2-1 after Pat Onstad made a mistake conceding an early corner which result in a Patrick Ianni bicycle kick goal. Ianni atoned for his first half loss of possession which led to the Dynamo goal.
In the end players like Chabala, Eric Ustruck, Julius James, Danny Cruz all took valuable experience out of the game that could serve them down the road as the Dynamo continued to push till the end. Seattle now within three points of the Dynamo.
We discuss this on DYNAMO ALL ACCESS WITH GLENN DAVIS tomorrow night on 790 The Sports Animal at 7pm.
On another Dynamo front Stuart Holden hit an absolute blast with a high degree of difficulty for the U.S. in a 2-2 Gold Cup draw with Haiti. Holden has shined in his two appearances in Gold Cup play scoring 2 goals while picking up his first two caps.
Dynamo camps are rolling and youth soccer players can sign up at www.houstondynamo.com
SOCCER MATTERS WITH GLENN DAVIS on Fox Sports Houston debuts next Saturday at 9am and will re-air three times weekly.
The magazine style show will feature highlights, interviews, opinion and much , much more!
Danish Inspirations
Fiesta Mart
Memorial Hermann Sports Medicine Institute
Nuesion.com
SportTalk 790
Zukowski, Bresenhan & Sinex, L.L.P.
To anyone who is interested. Channel 11.2 is not available in every sports bar. I know, because I had my Dynamo jersey on and went from sports bar to sports bar out in Katy and found no-one carried that station, let alone heard of it. Most of the Sports bar\’s use the Dish Channel and it is not available. Comcast has it but not every cable provider. That must have been quite a deal for the Dynamo to get but unfortunately most of us don\’t benefit from it. Next time I need to scout ahead of time and find a place that will show it. Has anyone else had problems with this station?
All Hooters carry 11.2 manny…
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I think yesterdays game was good experience for some of our bench…the long road trip was not that unsuccessful…so I won’t beat the guys over it…and yes..we were robbed…that was not a goal..i saw it LIVE even after all the replays we could tell we were robbed…
On to Stu…I think the goal Stu scored yesterday is the most important goal he’s ever scored in his career…why? because this goal lets Bradley and his teammates know that he’s there to claim a starting spot in the USMNT…
Stu deserves to be there as long as he’s playing like that…it hasn’t been just two goals…but 2 assists and 2 goals in two games…that’s darn PRODUCTIVE….
GO DYNAMO!!!!
Unbelievable goal by Holden. Just pure power and precision. The one he took before that was right on target too. That’s one thing the USA needs in a player that can come in and make strikes like that. Rossi did it for Italy in Confederations Cup and I was thinking who for the USA could do that. We have an answer, he’s done it countless times for the Dynamo.
Haiti deserved the win and the US got lucky yet again. Great goal by Stu Holden but other than that the performance was deplorable. US got an easy group compared to El Tri, El Tri was stuck with UNCAF Champs Panama and Guadalope the semi finalist from last Gold Cup that get to also play for French Nat Team. US got a weakened Honduras, Grenada, and Haiti…and the US only pulled off 7 points? Mexico winning today and pulling off 7 points would be a better performance. Both El Tri and USMNT have been disappointing, and dont give me this alternative team stuff because when Brazil or other top notch teams put out “B” or “Z” teams they still play like Brazil, because remember Copa America winning Brazil from a couple of years back were considered an alternative team and they beat Argentina without breaking a sweat!
My Honest Opinion,
Leo
Can’t believe I forgot…HOUSTON GOT ROBBED!!!!!!!!!!! I posted a link on the Fallas live chat yesterday and well it clearly did not cross the line! We need our own stadium so we can show those Seattle Flounders how a real football environment is supposed to look(That’s jealousy speaking)!
The Dynamo were robbed by a BAD call, period. I agree with you, Glenn, the technology is out there…..use it! The game should not have to dedend on 1 person’s snap judgement…”professional” or not. We saw many good things in yesterday’s game. The Dynamo gave us much to cheer about!!! The officiating gave us much to worry about. The Sounders’ field/fans/etc gave us much to envy and appreciate at the same time. They will really help the cause of soccer here in the USA. Glad they are in the MSL! Just wait until they come HERE. We were really proud of Stu’s play yesterday and especially the rocket that tied the game. Amazing! Wish our team were at full roster strength but we do have a deep bench, just look at yesterday! Ending note, SHOULD have been a tie after great effort by our men in orange. We are proud of them!!!
For what it’s worth, Seattle fans generally agree that it probably wasn’t over the line. (As far as I’ve seen, there are no TV shots with camera angles good enough to tell for sure.) Chalk this one up as “another reason we need goal line technology.”
On the other hand, we Seattlites have a hard time feeling bad about it because our team has been the victim of so many game-changing bad calls this year. This is just the goddess of karma rebalancing the scales. Unfortunately for you guys it happened to be against the Dynamo.
I think it was a bad call. But I think that the solution being tested at Europa League is better, because it would make the penalty box cleaner – Endline Judges.
Leo, I can’t wait until Houston gets its own facility, but please don’t cap it too low. That team and your community deserve something near HDC size. Turnout there is strong, sure you won’t be able to get 32,000+ for season, but to cap it at 20k would be a shame for Houston and the Dynamo.
Is the instant replay ever used in soccer games? If so we would have not been robbed in yesterdays game. I bet if you ask some Seattle fans they would agree. And, has the size of our new stadium been decided already? Just as long as the seating is all stadium seating and not the bleacher kind. Something like Pizza Hut Park, maybe?
I don’t think instant replay is the answer. It’s a fundamental part of the game to have instantaneous decisions that keep the game moving…and having a ticked off fan base (and a “we-dodged-a-bullet-there” fan base) is part of the game too. It’s imperfect, but integral.
Having said that, I wouldn’t mind the in-ball sensors that detect when the ball has entirely crossed the line. The notification to the center ref could be instantaneous. This week it would have favored the Dynamo, but another week it might favor our opponent — like how the US was favored when that one Brazil shot was ruled a no-goal when it had crossed the line in the Confederations Cup Final. I suppose we’d use the technology along only the goal line, although it could be used on the touch lines where the ARs tend to call the ball out when only half the ball crosses the line. Those generally aren’t game-changers, but it sure is irritating when they call it out even though the ball is only 75% across.
The thing is, the situations where it’s unclear if the ball crossed the goal line are fairly rare. The officiating issue that I find more pernicious is the inconsistent calling of fouls depending on where the foul occurred and on the whim of the ref. These calls and non-calls truly change the nature of the game, and even change the style of play used by an entire league. They can encourage a physical style at the expense of technique, or can go the other way and create a false sense of stylistic play that exists only because the defense is soft. I don’t think instant replay is the answer for this problem, but I wouldn’t mind a more stringent approach on the field that discourages mindless Jesse-Marsch-like destruction. This would also help us deal with the strict officiating that tends to hurt us in international matches. If we took this approach, the MLS would have to also adopt extensive post-match video review that severely punishes the divers and “simulation” that would invariably ensue.
Jumping from that soapbox: As for the stadium, we draw fewer than 20K during the season, but about 30K during the post-season. It’d be nice to have a stadium that can hold more than 20K with options to expand it to over 30K when we become a world power. Orange world domination is just around the corner, y’all.
Glenn- Think yesterday’s game speaks volumes for your Dynamo. Take Seattle on in that environment, lose on a suspect goal, and missing key players to boot ,bodes well for Houston’s chances come playoff time.
Beckham’s respone to Donovan’s book quotes, about what I would expect. He mentions how he’s played for big clubs his entire career and his professionalism never before questioned. Donovan hit nail on head, said things that AEG and MLS were afraid to.
Professionalism is honoring your commitments and contract. Beckham made fool out of Galaxy front office, Garber, and the league as a whole. Beckham’s attitude is all MLS fans should consider themselves lucky he consented to come back here and play a quarter of the season.
Big deal !
So Mexico got stuck in a Gold Cup group that involved the Uncaf Champs Panama and a Semi-Finalist from last Gold Cup in Guadalope and they managed to get the same amount points as the US! The US got stuck in a group with a depleted Honduras…remember no Pavon and no Suazo among others…and well Haiti and Grenada are second-rate teams….so Mexico can be argued pretty well in that they were superior than US in group play…See ya in the Finals USMNT and get ready to suffer the first loss in a month with the second coming August 12!!!!! ARRIBA MEXICO!!!!!!! THE US IS GOING DOWN!!!!!!
Mark my words…Mexico will beat US in final of Gold Cup thats if the US even makes it to the final and Pachuca will win the ConcaChampions group over Houston Dynamo!!!!!!!!
Mexico and Pachuca going for the double!!!!
Wow Leo! I think you’re what this blog needed…a Dynamo hater once in a while is a good thing…
Arriba el DYNAMO!!!
btw LEO Mexico’s been playing like cr@p! that’s all im gonna say..
Thanks for the compliment (kind of…
) Correction both USMNT and Tri are playing like “cr@p)!
From A Rave Green point of view, I was there at the game, and honestly can say I have no idea if that ball went over. And I don’t know that you’ll find any Sounders fan who could say definitively if that ball crossed. That being said, Houston, you guys are great, darn good time, and glad to have your kind of classy organization in the MLS. Hope you guys get a big stadium that is filled to the brim.
As another Sounder fan chiming in, I can tell you that I’m unsure. When it happened (my seat is just behind the goal), I was shouting that it went in. On replay, I really don’t think it did. My dad, on the other hand, has watched it roughly a bajillion times and is fully convinced it did. Either way, it was a call that went in our favor. We started out the match playing like ass, and finished very strongly. Now, if we can just get our starting defense and midfield back. The fact that we managed to win with Passback Pete V-Jay-Jay in the midfield is nothing short of a miracle.
I think the Dynamo came off well against a very good Sounders team at their home.
The Gold Cup team that Bradley fielded against Haiti had a few key players I’d never heard of or that had very few caps. Although we have a lot of good players in the States, we don’t have many with much international experience, and that showed against a decent-playing Haiti.
As for Leo and his ‘tri’, keep on trying! The US is the #1 team in Concacaf and will remain so for the foreseeable future. We are only getting better!
The replays I’ve seen sure seem to confirm that it was a missed call and never made it to the line. But missed calls happen.
My problem is that it never looked in in real time. I was in the stands on the AR’s sideline, getting much the same view as him, and it did not look in when it happened. Even the Seattle fans around me all instantly agreed that it was no goal.
I just don’t understand how that AR decided to call it a goal.
Donjuego, it is a mystery and the league officials, as usual, are SILENT! One never seems to get any info from the “officials” when there are missed/maybe missed calls. Bad calls happen all the time and NO explanation seems to ever be given. Someone told me of the “soccer gods”…. some calls go your way, some don’t. Seems to be a possible explanantion of controversial calls, anyway, as good as the total lack of explanantions from league officials. I would love to have more information on how/who/why/etc of MLS officiating. Does ANYONE control them or punish bad calling, etc? This is in general, not just recent games. Anyone have an answer as I really am interested?? Thanks!
The goal call was out of line.
Seattle is alright because (despite being a large crowd) they only support the team (or sing) when they’re winning. Call them out for this. In Houston when we’re support losing or winning!