Behind The Box Score

(I apologize for 1.taking a month long break, and 2.taking so long to write this article)

It was a cold and blustery Thursday night in Crew Stadium. For the home team and their fans, it was chilling night in more ways than one. 10,109 Crew faithful had to stomach a 3-2 loss to Real Salt Lake in the second of a 2-game aggregate goal series. Added to last Saturday’s 1-0 loss out in RSL, the defending champion Columbus Crew got ousted 4-2 over a 2-game span. “It’s disappointing. We had a dream start to the game,” goalie William Hesmer said. “The attitude was right. The energy was right then all of a sudden we lose focus. Our team defending on the first goal was poor. It’s the one I came closest to. After that they got some momentum.”

The beginning of the game certainly was the “dream start” that Hesmer talked about. Guillermo Barros Schelotto returned to the lineup and came out with extreme firepower, scoring on a long free kick in the 19th minute, and scored again in the 35th minute from the top of the penalty area. At the time, the Crew had the 2-1 lead in the aggregate-goal series. “We played well enough to get where we needed to be. It was 2-1 on aggregate. It was exactly where we wanted,” Crew midfielder Danny O’Rourke said. However, that was all there was to smile about for the 2-time Supporters Shield winners.

The next 12 minutes would prove to be deadly for Columbus, giving up 2 goals, Javier Morales adding the first in the 37th minute, and the second one during extra time on an extremely questionable call, awarding a penalty kick to Robbie Findley, who slipped the ball passed Hesmer to knot the score at 2. The second half didn’t turn around for Columbus as much as they tried to get it to. The only thing the Crew got in the second half was yellow cards, two of them, one to O’Rourke, and the other given to Moreno. The goal by Andy Williams in the 74th minute sealed the troubling fate for the home team. “Sometimes the better team doesn’t win. That’s the beauty of the sport — the team that plays attractive soccer, the team that plays good soccer doesn’t win,” head coach Robert Warzycha said of the loss.

Opinion: Before I start this section, I want to explain that this was the first Crew game I got to see in person. I had watched games on TV before, but there was nothing like this.

I don’t really know a whole lot about soccer when it comes to the in-depth rules or things along that line. But honestly, the officiating was horrible from what I do know. The call for the penalty kick right before halftime was nothing short of horrendous. Every call seemed to favor Real Salt Lake, and as the game continued to struggle along at 2-2, the calls kept piling in and in favor of RSL. From what I’ve heard, the official (Baldomero Toledo) is the worst official in the MLS. An interesting quote from O’Rourke about the PK and the call of it: “In a crucial game like this to call a PK like that when guys are falling, both guys pulling each other, you don’t call a PK. You don’t do it.” He goes on to say, “It’s like someone fouling the 3-point shooter and barely touching him on an NCAA final. Whatever. That’s what he saw. I didn’t see the same thing.”

Officiating should never take away from the game like it did Thursday. By calling the game so tense, you ruin the game. That is the same that can be said for any sport when it comes to officiating. It is always better to let the teams play it out instead of blowing the whistle every three seconds to stop play. You take away from the game that way.

But honestly, other than the officiating and the final score, it was a great time. Like I said, this was my first professional soccer game ever. For those of you who were like me and didn’t think you’d like watching soccer in person, your mistaken. Soccer is a great sport to watch in person, even on a freezing cold November night. I would like to thank two very important people for giving me this opportunity, an amazing girl Libby Schroeder and her dad for the ticket and the ride.