A Long Way to Go for No Johnny O'

Friday while I was over at SAS Soccer Park volunteering for the Rhinos game, Chris Economides got off the phone with the guys at DC United (where he was working on some of the details for the June 14th game) when he turns to me and says: "You want to go to the Chivas USA game tomorrow?" With the wife and kids out of town, who was I to pass up a 10 hour roundtrip roadtrip on a moment's notice to watch a 90 minute soccer match? After last week's display against RSL, I was actually eager to see Chivas USA play and the possibility of being in the stands to see John O'Brien play his first ever MLS game was enticing enough to get me to go. While Johnny didn't get off the bench (not a bad idea given the wet, baseball-scarred pitch), it was nice to see him wearing an MLS kit and I was impressed by the much improved Chivas. They gave DC a run for their money and probably will feel harshly done by on a couple of occasions. I was particularly impressed by the speed of Tim Regan in the back but was left scratching my head as to why a striker like Sacha Kjlestan was playing such a withdrawn midfield role (I suppose this will be O'Brien's position when he returns). One thing is for sure, Chivas USA is not going to be an easy 3 points for anyone this year. The good news is that the tickets Chris secured for us were not outside in the nasty rain and 40 degree weather but rather in a box with the DC United Reserves. So we managed to stay dry for the 5 hour drive home in the blinding rain and got to enjoy the game with Justin Moose, Stephen deRoux, Devon TcTavish, and a few other players whose names I didn't catch. The bad news is that my planned evening of sitting and watching 5 MLS matches on DirectKick was competely shot and now I have 7.5 hours of soccer on TiVo that I need to get through today!

-- Jarrett @ 4/09/2006 08:35:00 AM