Thoughts On a Season From Across the Atlantic
- DC Soccer correspondent Joseph Schoenbauer from Lusaka, Zambia, November 21, 2005
DC United’s end of season run-in transpired on unfamiliar grounds for me. As I moved to Lusaka, Zambia to take up a new position as a teaching intern with the organization Grassroot Soccer (www.grassrootsoccer.org) at the very end of September, I missed the final games of the MLS regular season and everything after. Every chance I could I got in touch with DC Soccer journalist Brian Weeks, read articles, downloaded highlights on the internet, and touched base with friends and family. I could still only imagine how DC United was playing going into the playoffs.
The day Steven Goff’s article was published in the Washington Post that focused on Freddy Adu’s inability to understand his current and future role within the teams’ makeup I was numb with frustration and incredulity. The following days’ article written by the same Steven Goff that focused on the attention his article received in soccer internet blogs was only confirmation that not only was he a bigger fan of himself than of DC United, but that he was even a bigger fan of himself than he was of Freddy Adu, which is by no means a small feat. But that’s really beside the point.
Certainly, we as fans and even as journalists, can not point the finger at just one person in this debacle that was certainly a great disruption for the team, being as it was just weeks before the regular season ended and the playoffs began. Personally, I blame the outburst on three factors. Firstly, I blame Peter Nowak and the rest of the DC United coaching staff for most likely failing to give a good enough explanation to the 16-year old Freddy Adu as to why his performances in games and in practice did not ensure him of a consistent role in the starting eleven. Secondly, I blame Freddy Adu for losing his patience at such an important part of the season, for putting himself before the team, and for saving his outburst for the journalists rather than for a meeting the next day with his coach. Lastly, I blame the media, specifically Steven Goff of the Washington Post, for being a fame-hungry journalist looking to get a hot-topic story out of a frustrated 16-year old boy. Certainly any journalist has the right to publish any story that is newsworthy, and I don’t blame him for that. I just want to make sure I never hear Mr. Goff ever go around telling people that he is a DC United fan, because he certainly knew the story would cause a severe disruption within the DC United team, which is something no self-respecting DC United fan could ever do. And it did disrupt the team.
As luck would have it, I was unable to follow the opening game of the playoffs in Chicago as no internet could be accessed so early in the morning here in Zambia, where we are currently eight hours ahead of Chicago. First chance I got, I smiled with glee when I was able to read that DC United was in pole position going into the 2nd leg, which was to be played at RFK. As luck would have it again, my work took me to Mayukwayukwa Refugee Camp in the Western Province of Zambia, where I was very, very far from knowing the result of the game for a full week’s time. So for a week I pondered the result, positive that DC United could overcome the adversity to put in a strong performance worthy of the home support’s constant drumming and chanting.
I couldn’t believe me eyes when I saw the 0-4 score line. It was like Zach Thornton had sat on me while I was forced to watch Jesse Marsch highlights from his time as a DC United player. A nightmare. Days later I had the “opportunity” to actually catch the game highlights on a TV program entitled “Golazo!” Final proof that a DC United team, so accustomed to getting results in front of strong support at RFK, and reigning MLS champions, really did fall apart.
Yet the season was not at all lost because of a premature exit from the 2005 playoffs. The strong play of Bolivian Jaime Moreno and Argentinean Christian Gomez led them to be named to the MLS Best 11, while further strong play led to return or first ever call-ups to the US National team for midfielders Ben Olsen, Santino Quaranta, Brian Carroll, and Clyde Simms, in hopes of making the journey next summer to Germany for the 2006 World Cup. Fans were able to enjoy stunning individual efforts from Jaime Moreno and Freddy Adu, among others, and also exceptional goals from the result of beautiful sequences of passing and movement. With the additions of further youthful and talented players like Facundo Erpen, a bright upcoming season is a possibility.
In the meantime, we shall sit and wait on any news dealing with the future of teenage star Freddy Adu, in hopes that something positive will come out of the current predicament the coaching staff, the players, Freddy Adu himself, and the fans have become apart of, so that we can look to the future of the most successful team in MLS history.