Photo by ISIPhotos.com
By TATE STEINLAGEĀ
It was Sporting Kansas City’s turn to benefit from a second half stoppage-time goal Saturday after two heartbreaking finishes earlier in the season, as Dom Dwyer’s 92nd minute blast helped boost the reigning MLS Cup champions over the Colorado Rapids 3-2 at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park.
“I think what we did was we kept pushing and we kept trying,” Sporting KC manager Peter Vermes said after the match. “I don’t think that we were firing on all cylinders today, but what I do think is that we stayed and at least tried to keep playing. We kept trying to push it to stay in there. At the end we scored a great third goal, and I thought the guys managed the game thereafter.”
Sporting KC found itself in desperation mode after the Rapids stormed ahead 2-1 in the 78th minute on its fifth penalty kick of the year, and second of the match. However, just a minute later midfielder Benny Feilhaber, who committed the foul on Shane O’Neill that led to the second penalty, helped the visitors equalize with a rebounded attempt just in front of the box.
“It was a great response by the whole team, because when they kicked off we went right at them,” Vermes said. “We got wide, the ball got played across, and Benny (Feilhaber) got in to the box. He takes two whacks at it and the second one goes in, so it was strong determination.”
Dwyer’s game-winning goal would be aided partially by a red card in the 85th minute on Colorado defender Marvell Wynne, leaving the Rapids with only 10 men for the rest of the match.
The afternoon’s scoring got opened up in the 50th minute after a dismal first half for both teams when Graham Zusi found an opening in the middle of the box, just wide enough for fellow forward Sal Zizzo to sneak a pass through the box, to Zusi, and into the back of the net.
The Rapids were led in scoring by forward Vicente Sanchez, who scored both penalty kicks for Colorado. The first was awarded after a questionable handball call on Sporting KC defender Ike Opara in the 60th minute, who appeared to unintentionally fall on top of the ball after being hit in the shin. Opara would have to be subbed off minutes later with an injury that Sporting KC believe is not long term.
The result pushes Sporting KC’s record to 2-1-1, while dropping the Colorado Rapids’ to 1-1-1. Both sides return to action next Saturday, Sporting KC at home against Real Salt Lake, and Colorado on the road against the Vancouver Whitecaps.
Here are the match highlights:
Real Goals
Benny with two key passes and a goal. Zusi with two key passes and a goal. Zizzo with two key passes. I really enjoy American attacking midfielders making things happen in MLS.
I felt like Guy Pierce from Memento wrote this game summary. It’s actually a fine approach to story telling, but a couple of the smaller paragraphs blew the theme, and to me, were confusingly placed. Forgive my negativity, I’m still upset about the Raps giving this one away.
No mention of the red card that wasn’t on Kronberg. That was the biggest boost to SKC today, courtesy of the man in yellow.
Ref more than made it up to you guys with the phantom spot kick call on Opara. Ref made bad calls for both sides, but SKC found a way to overcome the bad officiating. Colorado didn’t. Winners win, losers make excuses.
Thanks for the sermon.
Both penalties were legit. Too bad SKC just wasn’t properly dropped to 10 men early in the game.
The second penalty was legit. But I doubt you will find many, if any, neutral observers who believe the first one was remotely legit. Even the Rapids announcers were reduced to saying, basically, “Yeah, the call sucked, but it makes up for Kronberg not getting sent off.”
OK sure thanks
Meanwhile my original comment was in reference to the article, which interestingly fails to even mention the bizarre sequence where the ref not only doesn’t send off the SKC keeper but also denies the Rapids’ quick restart and nullifies the goal from it, all in order to show that keeper a yellow. This again was a much bigger boost to SKC on the afternoon than anything else.
Not saying it wasn’t a boost to SKC for Kronberg to stay on the pitch. When I heard the whistle blow on that play, I was expecting him to be sent off, and I say that as an SKC fan.
But if you’re going to (rather strongly) imply that the officiating affected the eventual outcome of the match while not acknowledging the inexplicable nature of the first spot kick, that’s just being a homer.
Homerism would be well exemplified by denying that the officiating on that play affected the overall outcome of the match, regardless of what was called later on that penalty (or not). That call wasn’t made as a make-up call. It would have been called the same had SKC had a man ejected earlier. Just watch how on top of it the ref is and how quick the call is.
Clearly going without that keeper and a man down for the majority of the game, the result would have been quite different. Yet that whole sequence gets no mention here, as per my original comment), even while the penalty call does.
This is something you get rather used to seeing if you read the media on the Rapids.
RB = whiny Bitch. The play could as easily be spun as a foul by the Rapids player. If it wasn’t the GK involved if you’d put a defender in that situation and the Rapids player had went through him knocking the SKC player to ground it would have been a foul by the Rapids player. Colorado was lucky to get the call they got.
I guess your lack of class outdoes your lack of soccer knowledge here, but it’s close…