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After 0-0 Draw in DC, Crew Enter World Cup Break Mid-Table

Not much in this one as neither the Crew or DC can find the back of the net the weekend before the World Cup starts.

1ST HALF (0-0)
Crew make do while missing starters Giancarlo Gonzalez, Waylon Francis (World Cup, Costa Rica), Federico Higuain (hamstring) and Wil Trapp (knee sprain, or something...). Ben Speas and Agustin Viana fill in the midfield as Eric Gehrig and Tyson Wahl also get starts. Not much happens. An early shot from Fabian Espindola is all we got.

2ND HALF (0-0)
Three more shots on frame (Adam Bedell's take late was alright) and a horribly missed penalty from Espindola at the death bring this one to an end.

FINAL (0-0)
Despite playing with a number of backups, the Crew were the better side on this night. The patchwork defense of Gehrig, Wahl along with Viana in the middle played really well. Bernardo Anor also had a good one but he was often overrunning Hector Jimenez from the left back position. Might take them a few games to get used playing together.

The Crew enter the World Cup break 14th on the overall true table (ppg table) and right on the edge of the eastern conference playoff picture, for whatever that is worth.

Not sure this is how Anthony Precourt drew up the season but with only one win since we were freezing our tails off back in March whatever, the Crew can count themselves lucky. World Cup here we come!

PODCAST: Red Cards in Helltown - Episode III

Helltown on SoundCloud



Third episode of our Red Cards in Helltown podcast recorded today as Jim Bach, David Burgin and myself join host Rick Gethin to gather our thoughts on a variety of topics.

 01:05  SEGMENT 1 - Headlines
• World Cup starts this week, quick overviews, favorites
• 12soccer.com's "Bridging the Great Divide..." kicks off discussion on MLS
• David Villa loan to ALeague, future of big club expansion

 19:05  SEGMENT 2 -Columbus Crew
• Dominic Oduro, Álvaro Rey trade
• DC United (Jim called it, dull match)
• Berhalter sounds happy to David, is a striker coming?
• Trapp injury or The Conspiracy Theory (??)

 35:35  SEGMENT 3 - World Cup
• US Men's National Team
• Group G discussion
• A rundown of all groups, who's advancing, who isn't (saving these!)

 55:00  SEGMENT 4 - Quick Hit, Wrap Up
• Jim talks about top jersey's sold in MLS

That's it for this week, thanks for listening!

Predictions: Crew Rd 15 (DC away)

The Columbus Crew wrap up their busy week with a game in the nation's capital today when they face DC United at RFK FedEx Field. Should be a huge crowd on hand as there is a lead-in international friendly between El Salvador and Spain.

 GAME NOTES 
CLB: Two major absences - Federico Higuain and Wil Trapp
CLB: Loss puts them firmly in bottom half blender
CLB: Away form is 5 pts from last 6, -3 goal difference
DCU: Only 1 loss at home this year (1st game vs Crew)
DCU: Look to have full accompaniment of regular starters (save Kitchen)
DCU: Only allowed 7 goals in 8 games at RFK this year

 TEN PREDICTIONS 
Number on left is percentage accuracy picking 2014 Columbus Crew results only.

57% WHOSCORED.COM ... DC UNITED
Graham Ruthven has been hitting on Crew games with astonishing accuracy. Calls Columbus an erratic side and, at the time of the writing, that's with Higuain playing. 2-1 DC.

50% COLUMBUS DISPATCH ... DC UNITED
"The losses of Wil Trapp (knee) and Federico Higuain (hamstring) to injuries will exacerbate the situation," says Adam Jardy. Pick up a paper today, Jardy has all the details on the Oduro, Rey trade.

43% MLSSOCCER ... DC UNITED
Overwhelmingly DC today, 5 of 6 and only one Draw. Everybody there is doing better with picks this year, strangely five of them are right on 40% correct. Only Jason Saghini stands above with 44%.

43% WIN DRAW WIN ... DC UNITED
Your Votes section has Crew at lowest percentage of year with 16%. DC walking way with 53%. Medium stake on 2-0 home win.

36% BET365 ... DC UNITED
23/20 DC (fav), 20/10 draw, 12/5 Crew

36% GOAL.COM ... DRAW
No lean to be found in Thomas Floyd's preview today. Does mention host of absences for both sides.

36% HOME TEAM ... DC UNITED

14% TABLE POSITION ... DC UNITED

--% WV HOOLIGAN ... (no pick)

--% MASSIVE REPORT ... (no pick)
Head on over to Massive Report or Black and Red United to read Patrick Murphy's excellent take on today's match.

 MY PREDICTION - A CREW WIN! 

I'm kidding. This one is about as a sure thing as you will ever see for a MLS game. Outside of the lead in game there is the fact that DC doesn't have that last day of school feel yet that the Crew have (which was evident with some of the player tweets last night (WHICH IS PERFECTLY OK, WHICH I LIKE, WHICH MAKES THE TEAM MORE FUN, WHICH THEY USE TO DO MORE OFTEN AND IT WAS FINE)).

You also find some evidence of that last day before break with handling of Federico Higuain and Wil Trapp injuries. I reached out to Massive Report's Managing Editor Patrick Guldan and beat writer Patrick Murphy they both believed Higuain would be out but they were not sure on Trapp. In either case, the decision to hold them out is easier when a break is eminent.

This DC team is about as MLS experienced as they get and you need that experience to know how to play during a season so disrupted by the World Cup. This is a first for all the Crew players except Tyson Wahl.

A couple things to watch this evening on the Crew side is if Ethan Finlay can keep things humming (he is in full form, 3 goals and an assist in just 275 mins this year) and see if Ben Speas (two assists in last two appearances) gets a crack at a starting role. Tonight is also a great opportunity for the other midfielders to leave Crew HC Berhalter with a good impression before new arrival Alvaro Rey joins the squad.

Expect Columbus to maintain control of the ball this match with DC looking for daggers on the counter or quick transitions from interceptions and mistakes.

Weather looks perfect over there in my old stomping grounds. Should be a great day for soccer fans out there.

Crew Remain Mystery, Draw RSL

Late goal salvages point for the Crew at home when they should have earned three.

1ST HALF (0-0)
Early in the match former Crew college draft pick Rich Balchan pulls down Austin Viana in the box and earns a penalty that Federico Higuain misses. Not long after Higuain appears to pull his hamstring, gets subbed before half.

A Josh Williams rip around the 20th is the only shot on target from either side. After these few events, the game continues on at a half speed pace till half.

2ND HALF (1-1)
Salt Lake hangs back for the opening minutes of the half before turning up the pressure on the Crew in search for a goal. After pushing the Crew back for about five full minutes RSL gets the breakthrough they were looking for when Luis Gil scores off a rebound from a Kenny Mansally shot from distance.

Nearly thirty minutes passed before the Crew started to apply pressure to RSL to pull it back, which they did when Ben Speas placed a beautiful and perfectly placed through ball to Ethan Finlay for a crafty chip that beat the goalkeeper for a goal.

FINAL (1-1)
The final stats (those shitty stats pundits talk about, not the ones I like) tell us that the Columbus Crew dominated this game. Plenty of shots (21!) and shots on target (7!!). Heck, check out what the mighty WhoScored.com summed up the Crew events:

• Created a high number of chances relative to their possession
• Were effective at creating goalscoring opportunities from through balls
• Were effective at creating goalscoring opportunities from the flanks
• Were effective at creating goalscoring opportunities from set-pieces

Wow! No. Not really. Five of the Crew 7 shots on frame didn't come till the 75th minute. This game didn't have much of a pulse for long stretches. Even after RSL scored the Crew showed zero urgency. It had me thinking that the players were more concerned with holding to a system than getting after a win.

Old me might have thought poorly of that but I'm not so sure these days. Is it bad not to chase a goal directly after your opponent scores when you have 30 minutes to make it up? Depends, I guess. What we do know is that the Crew were doing most of the things right in possession but didn't have anything going up to, and 20 minutes after, the RSL goal.

It wasn't until an on fire Ethan Finlay and hungry Ben Speas warmed up to the match in sub roles that something magical happened to save a point. Well, mostly magical. After the goal Crew players and fans (including smoke from the Nordecke) acted like the team won the MLS Cup instead of grabbing the ball quickly in order to get the game restarted.

I try and keep up with Crew games by not only watching them but sitting down for a couple hours trying to sort them out. A good old fashioned postmortem, if you will (says the 13 year vet of manufacturing). I think it's vital to understanding the local team and the league as a whole. Usually, at least since 2011 when I started following closely, I have the Crew pegged by June. Even sorted out the Higuain signing.

This year? Still working on it. Results have been poor but the metrics say this team is in good (not great) shape even though they only have one win since starting the season off with three a million years ago.

So as site writer and Red Cards in Helltown colleague said... "with their position and goal difference, they have to be doing something right."

What that is? Not sure yet.

Predictions: Crew Rd 14 v. RSL

Real Salt Lake is in town this evening to take on the Crew. Kickoff is 7:30 PM Eastern.

 GAME NOTES:
CLB: Missing Gonzalez and Francis from back line (World Cup)
CLB: Trapp looks to start, slight knee injury
RSL: Nightmare loss to Seattle past weekend 4-0
RSL: Missing a couple (including Kyle Beckerman) to World Cup

 TEN PREDICTIONS
Number on left is percentage accuracy picking 2014 Columbus Crew results only.

54% WHOSCORED.COM ... DRAW
"Without Kyle Beckerman, Jess Cassar's side lack its midfield spine and this is a chance for the Crew to exploit that," says Graham Ruthven. Ultimatly see's this one as even.

46% COLUMBUS DISPATCH ... DRAW (RSL lean)
No real prediction from Adam Jardy this week. He does mention that the Crew are "under pressure to earn crucial points before the World Cup break against a formidable team that will be missing some key parts because of injury and call-ups."

46% WIN DRAW WIN ...REAL SALT LAKE
For an away side, very strong for RSL this week in both vote (42%) and medium stake on Away win 0-1.

38% BET365 ... COLUMBUS CREW
Home side odds tonight 21/20 Crew (12/5 Draw, 5/2 Away).

38% HOME TEAM ... COLUMBUS CREW

38% MLSSOCCER.COM ... DRAW
This one is straight down the middle. Two Crew, Two RSL, Two Draw.

21% GOAL.COM ... DRAW
No real lean in the summary, Readers like RSL.

15% TABLE POSITION ... REAL SALT LAKE

--% MASSIVE REPORT ... (no pick)
Head on over to Massive Report to get the latest on the Crew.

--% WV HOOLIGAN ... (no pick)

 MY PREDICTION
Anything is possible tonight with all the missing players, which is probably why we see a lot of "draw" predictions. I think that's fair. In other news: Crew fans could see the playing return of both Cole Grossman and Rich Balchan tonight for RSL.

Might see some more rain tonight, either way the playing surface will be slick. Don't expect many at this one but should be a nice one to watch. Enjoy the match.

Late Game Mistakes, Crew Fall to Reds

Mistakes do the Columbus Crew as they go from being a goal up in the 80th minute to a goal down by the time the final whistle blows.

1ST HALF (1-1)
New faces in both line ups meant sloppy play for most of the first half but there was a moment of some brilliance in the 18th when the Crew countered Toronto and scored via Justin Meram. The transition from defending to attacking was the best we've seen from Columbus all year.



Celebrations didn't last too long because Toronto immediately pressed hard for a goal and got one when Tyson Wahl reached out and grabbed Jermaine Defoe's shoulder as he slipped past. Penalty called and finished.

2ND HALF (2-1)
The uneven, broken play of the first half subsided and both teams found some rhythm for the first 20 minutes of the 2nd half. A Ben Speas sub in the 61st minute paid off immediately when he played a perfect corner to Agustin Viana for headed goal to put the Crew up 1-2 with 15 minutes left to play.

Toronto became more and more aggressive in their attack subbing on Gilberto and Dwayne De Rosario late. The Crew didn't have enough to hold them off for long and they ended up with two goals in the final 10 minutes of play (Defoe 81' - off a Parkhurst ball handing error and Henry in added time, poor marking on the big lad).

FINAL (3-2)
The Crew are probably frustrated because they let the lead go twice but Toronto always looked good for a few goals in this one. With both Federico Higuain and Wil Trapp out (as well has Giancarlo Gonzalez and Waylon Francis on World Cup duty) the attacking abilities of Toronto was too much for Columbus to overcome.

A busy week for Columbus continues Wednesday when they take on Real Salt Lake at home.

PODCAST: Red Cards in Helltown - Episode II

Episode II of Red Cards in Helltown podcast recorded this Sunday morning with a full panel of contributors. Host Rick Gethin, Justin Bell, Jim Bach, David Burgin and myself dig into a whole lot and probably more than we should.

Just like last week (and as we will do going forward) the show is limited to 60 minutes and recorded straight through (warts and all). Still early in the process but we are happy with how it's going and having a great time. Hope you like it, thanks for listening!

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Here's a rundown of the topics we cover this week:

 00:45 SEGMENT 1 - HEADLINES
• US Open Cup, NASL vs (the) MLS vs ... motivation
• Indy Eleven, Columbus Crew (Dayton Dutch Lions)
• NYCFC, Frank Lampard, David Villa
• Cost of performance and cost of world wide brands

 19:20 SEGMENT 2 - COLUMBUS CREW
• Disagreement on whether or not results matter this year
• Spending money in the right place
• Team building
• Scoring costs money, commitment to spending
• "Something good going on"... Zero goal difference
• RSL preview, should be good
• "We don't have very good players. To sum up... we don't have really good players"

 41:50 SEGMENT 3 - WORLD CUP, INT'L COVERAGE
• Match fixing ("Bags of hundred dollar bills")
• Picking the best 23 players, transform USMNT program
• Copa America, going to be awesome
• Klinsmann Donovan, Warzycha GBS

 53:43 SEGMENT 4 - WRAP UP, QUICK HITS
• Issues with German team heading into the World Cup
• "Deserving Wins" in MLS
• "Earning your way in"
• NYCFC "earn" the right to play in a baseball stadium