Match Report: FC Dallas 1, Pachuca 1
July 29th, 2007 . 6:51 pm . By: Jamie Fougerousse
After 73 scoreless minutes that included a disallowed goal for FC Dallas, the Hoops went ahead as Carlos Ruiz poked in a Bobby Rhine cross spilled by Pachuca keeper Miguel Calero. As the clock wound down and Pachuca threw everything forward, Adrian Serioux clipped Damian Alvarez in the box. Christian Gimenez converted the PK to keep Pachuca alive in the Superliga tournament going into the third set of group matches. The big story for FC Dallas was the return of starting goalkeeper Dario Sala. The Argentine had his injured knee wrapped but showed no sign of problems on it in pre-game warm-ups. Bobby Rhine replaced the suspended Drew Moor at right back, but otherwise Dallas started the same lineup they did against Chivas Tuesday night. Pachuca made one change to the lineup that lost to the LA Galaxy Tuesday by replacing midfielder Andres Chitiva with Damian Alvarez. Dallas came out blazing as the game began. Defender Clarence Goodson had two headers, one on goal off an Adrian Serioux throw-in, in the opening two minutes. After the exciting opening, the game settled down. Both teams knocked the ball around the midfield and neither seemed able to get out of the middle third of the field. The hot, humid air seemed to sap the life out of everyone as there was little energetic movement off the ball by either side. Pachuca finally had a couple good chances in the later part of the first half. In the 36th minute, Marvin Cabrera got a cross off from the right end line. As supporters gasped, Serioux and Sala collided; Serioux blocked the cross and Dario scooped it up. Just after that, Chris Gbandi lost his shoe and could not find a stoppage to put it back on properly. While he struggled with it, Gimenez beat him and got another dangerous cross in front of the Dallas goal. Carlos Rodriguez met it and got a good shot off to the left side of the goal. Sala got a fingertip to it that pushed it into the post to save the goal. This seemed to wake the Hoops up, as they worked the ball to the other end and attacked for the rest of the half. After a foul on Ricardinho, Carlos Ruiz put the free kick on goal and forced a save out of Calero. Stoppage time brought yet another controversial referee decision against Dallas in this Superliga tournament. Juan Toja whipped a pretty cross in from the right side. Goodson got in behind the defense and put a free header in the net as the assistant referee raised the offsides flag. Upon a close review of the replays, Goodson timed his run perfectly and should have been awarded the goal. Pachuca came out of the locker room with guns blazing, producing four quality chances on goal in the first eight minutes of the second half. All were crosses into the area, the first from Cabrera on the right that Alvarez put just wide at the far post. The second two were to Marquez, one from each side, which he could not get on goal. Luis Gabriel Rey flicked a free kick on with his head and hit the crossbar in the 53rd minute. Dallas had a great chance in the 55th minute as Arturo Alvarez cut inside across the right edge of the penalty area and laid the ball off for Carlos Ruiz. The ball was a little awkward for Ruiz, who connected with his left foot and forced a good save from Calero against the direction he was moving. Like the first half, the game then settled down and became a midfield battle. Marcelo Saragosa had a great game breaking up Pachuca’s passing lanes. Arturo Alvarez had more success getting up the right side. But between the heat and the referee’s fondness for blowing his whistle every time two players came near each other, things got pretty lethargic for the middle part of the second half. In the 69th minute, Pachuca replaced Rey with Andres Chitiva. Dallas followed by bringing on Dominic Oduro for Ricardinho as both sides adjusted their attack. Approaching the final fifteen minutes, each team started to find ways out of the middle third of the field. Both defenses did good jobs of snuffing out chances, but the game clearly opened up at this point. Dallas finally broke through in the 74th minute. After Pachuca broke up a Dallas attack on the left side, Pablo Ricchetti got the ball out to Bobby Rhine on the right. Rhine whipped a cross into the six-yard box. As Calero went down to meet the ball as it hit the ground, Dominic Oduro arrived on his run. Oduro screened the keeper enough that all he could do was redirect the ball to the far post. Carlos Ruiz beat Juan Toja in the race to poke it in for the goal, giving Dallas the 1-0 lead. The lead only lasted about 12 minutes. As Damian Alvarez cut across the inside edge of Dallas’ penalty box, Adrian Serioux stabbed in and caught a small piece of Alvarez’s foot. Referee Samir Osman awarded the penalty kick. Christian Gimenez sent Sala the wrong direction and converted the PK to tie the game. The pace of the game picked up considerably after the penalty. In the 89th minute, Dominic Oduro beat the offsides trap and found himself one-v-one with Calero. Oduro held the ball up waiting for Ruiz, who was making a run to far post. Oduro laid off a decent ball for Ruiz, but a recovering Lopez was able to push it out for a corner. The referee called for five minutes of stoppage time. Dallas threw everything forward, but could not find the goal. Dario Sala even had to save the game by stopping a good shot by Chitiva. After that, Ruiz was tugged down by Lopez in the box as he turned with the ball, but his appeals for a penalty were ignored. Oduro had one more chance in the last minute when he again beat the trap and faced Calero on the left side. His pace meant by the time he got the ball under control he had very little angle. He fired straight at the keeper, who pushed it wide at the near post. The game ended in a big yelling and shoving scrum after Mosquera threw Serioux down, but the score remained 1-1. So at the end of the second round of Superliga Group A games, Chivas leads the group with four points. LA is in second with 3, Dallas is in third with 2, and Pachuca is last with 1 point. The top two teams advance, and it all comes down to the third round; no one is out yet. LA brings their traveling circus to Dallas Tuesday night while Pachuca and Chivas both head to Dick’s Sporting Goods park in Denver for their clash.
Pachuca (0-1-1) vs. FC Dallas (0-0-2) Scoring Summary: Pachuca Lineup:
Substitutes Not Used: Braulio Godinez, Humberto Hernandez, Victor Manon, Luis Montes, Jose Torres FC Dallas Lineup:
Substitutes Not Used: Ray Burse, Michael Dello-Russo, Dax McCarty, Aaron Pitchkolan, Abe Thompson, David Wagenfuhr
Misconduct Summary: Referee: Samir Osman 2 Comments Comments RSS TrackBack Identifier URI Leave a comment | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Ruiz Goal & team effort
SuperLiga Refs
Attendance: 7,953
Is that SUM or the front office? Either way, disappointing for what has turned out to be a great tournament to watch.
The refs did not cost Dallas the three points against Pachuca. No doubt that they blew the call on Goodson’s no goal. However, FCD had taken the lead despite that call and just needed to close out the game.
Bigger factors in the final result of the game was Serioux’s aggresiveness, and Oduro’s lack of polish in front of goal.