That's a mega juggling act!

It certainly was a mega juggling act by Chicago tonight, two handballs in the box, both accidental, sure, but both very clear and the sort of thing that regularly gets called.  Both penalties not given.  Not to cast aspersions on the ref or the Fire, they'd never get involved with this sort of thing, but can someone check the ref's bag on the wayout to see if Nery Castillo's shirt is in there.

Joking aside, this time I'd agree with Preki that we didn't get the breaks we deserved, I thought overall, even though the result was another 0-0 that leaves our playoff chances hanging by an even slimmer thread than before, we played well today, and played a well coached team to the best of our ability given the players at our disposal.

Given the extra quality Chicago have, with Freddie Ljungberg, Nery Castillo and Collins John all starting and Brian McBride on the bench, sitting back to absorb the pressure would have been suicidal, and thankfully we didn't do that.  We went with two up front with De Ro and De Guzman pushing up, and Usanov and Harden getting forward from both full back positions.  We'd also obviously been told to be aggresive and not let them play, as we quickly racked up the fouls.   That it came to nothing in the first half is down to the fact that the two we played up front, Peterson and White, is probably the most insipid forward line in MLS history, that and the non-penalties, but hey at least we were trying.

In the second half, we brought on Maicon Santos for Peterson and things immediately improved, with a bit of quality to go with the added numbers we were throwing forward, we looked a lot more fluid and dangerous up front, even if our best chances were still coming from set pieces.   He obviously wasn't fully fit though and soon faded, and when Garcia and Nane were brought on, it was obvious we were settling for the point.

So overall a good game for Preki the coach in my opinion and a much more entertaining game than we've seen recently, with Chicago also having their chances.

Now the fact that we had Peterson and White up front, is quite the damning indictment of Mo and Preki's personnel decisions, our squad just isn't good enough to withstand a few injuries, in contrast look at the forwards Chicago has as mentioned above, and you can add Guatemalan international Marco Pappa to that list who also scored a bunch of goals for them this year as well.

As for our DP, Mista wasn't playing, not even on the bench, it was mentioned that he took a knock, and I'm very eager to see what stories come out of the woodwork as far as this is concerned.

What's that Jim Mora, you want me to talk about playoffs?  Ok then.  Much like the black Knight we're not dead yet, but we're pretty much at the "I'll bite your legs off" stage. 




With 7 games left we need at least 4 wins and a draw, probably 5 games, and while it's a weak schedule so it's just about plausible, I can't see Santos and Barrett coming back quickly enough to enable us to do it.  I await the North End Elite's banner selection for the DC game on saturday with baited breath.