By Brian Jennings

Omar Cummings had a foot in all the scoring Saturday night in Commerce City, CO as he led the Rapids past DC United notching two goals and assisting on the third.  Goalkeeper Matt Pickens pitched the shutout for Colorado as they took down the Eastern Division leaders with early strikes in each half.

In the 11th minute, Pablo Mastroeni played a neat through ball to Cummings past his defender Greg Janicki on the left side. Cummings touched the ball past, hopped over the slide tackle, and coolly drew keeper Josh Wicks to the near post before pounding his shot to the far side. 

“I saw Jakey (Peterson) coming in, there was an option of passing, but decided to take it,” said the Jamaican international, who has made a strong case for his inclusion on their upcoming Gold Squad selection.  “I was close enough to goal so take it.  As a forward you have to take those opportunities where you’ve been working on it in practice and hopefully see it pay off in matches.” 

Cummings almost hit for a second in the 29th minute as recent signee Pat Noonan played a nice give-and-go giving Omar a drive from 30 yards but the shot was saved by a diving Wicks.  The ensuing corner kick found Ugo Ihemelu smacking his shot off the post, the ball rebounded out to the middle where Mastroeni’s blast was tipped off the crossbar in a crazy sequence on goal.

Colorado worked on being more attacking-minded over their 10 days off, according to Peterson, and it began to pay off.  “We talked about that for the bye week-how we can exploit them, hit the channels, use pace to get behind.  We wanted to keep it tight, but we wanted to counter and attack with some passion and I thought we did that.”

“We went with a very attacking formation,” said Cummings who was on his way to a big night.  “Jakey and Colin (Clark) were told to push more, so Pat was more in behind me.  It was a very attacking lineup, almost like 3 forwards with Pat a little in behind, so it was good.  

DC United made their first real threat in the 43rd minute off a freekick.  Ex-Rapid Christian Gomez sent the ball to the far post where Chris Pontius made a flick on the endline, but Rapids keeper Matt Pickens was right on the post for the save.  Just two minutes later, things went from bad to worse for the visitors.  An errant backpass by Avery John fell right in stride to Cummings past Janicki.  Cummings faked Wicks to the ground, touched wide right, then hammered goal number two from a tough side angle just before half.

When asked what he expected from Colorado, DC defender Dejan Jakovic stated simply, “A lot of movement off the ball-that’s what we expected-just a lot of fatigued legs.  Kind of had trouble dealing with it and we had a couple of mistakes on our own that we didn’t need to.”

Colorado Head Coach Gary Smith was delighted with the halftime scoreline, but admitted his side hadn’t really played their best football in the first 45 minutes.  “I have no problem with the amount of energy, the finishing, the way that the players defensively attacked the game, the determination to keep the clean sheet, and to make life difficult for a talented DC team.”

“That’s my only frustration is that we were just wasteful with the ball in the first half.  The first 45, we squandered the ball too much but I thought the second half display was much better.”

That they did as Cummings once again got things moving in the 49th minute as he carried the ball to the left side endline.  At the last moment, he dropped the ball into the middle of the box for an unmarked Colin Clark making a following run who nailed the shot past a helpless Wicks for a 3-0 lead. 

“It was a tough game,” admitted Jacob Peterson.  “The first half we weren’t our best.  The second half, I think getting the early goal, really kind of set the momentum for the second.  We talked about a good start.  We didn’t come out with great energy but we got the goal and that kind of helps us get over that in both halves.  Especially the second, I think the next team to get a goal was really going to be the one to take control of the game.”

DC United tried to mount a comeback in the second frame, changing formations and getting Santino Quaranta more involved but Pickens and the Rapids defense didn’t give them much opportunity.  “We were having to come back from a 2 goal deficit.  We went with a much more offensive thought process but we exposed ourselves a little bit in the back,” explained DC Head Coach Tom Soehn.  “That’s going to be natural when you’re coming back. I felt Pickens made some key saves where we tried to get back in the game.  If we score one of those the momentum might carry us.”

In the 54th minute, Quaranta sent a cross in for a Pontius header but once again Pickens was there to make a one-handed punch.  Minutes later, Gomez forced another athletic save after his shot was partially deflected on it’s way on goal. 

“It’s hard to go through a game for 90 minutes on the outside looking in,” admitted Quaranta, whose side only arrived in Denver late Friday from Seattle.  “Even being down you still want try to find the game and create.  (Pickens) made some good saves.  If we score, go 3-1 or 3-2, it makes it a different game.  They had so many, so wide-open, we were so unorganized we struggled big time.  It’s not a shape thing, formation, it just a way we did it.  The first two goals are our mistake.”

“I don’t think we had a good energy tonight.  We came off an emotional game Wednesday and historically we don’t do well here.  This has been a long week for us.  It’s no excuse, but I don’t think our effort was there today.  We’ve done well this year coming back but I think today didn’t seem too positive.”

Colorado, however, was rightfully thrilled with not only the result but the fact that their old teammate Gomez did not hurt them on the night, as Smith pointed out. “A benchmark of how the team played is when we walk in and go, ‘how many times did Christian touch the ball?’ Tonight, I thought our work rate and our endeavor overpowered their talent.  Another night, who knows, but tonight that’s all that matters.”

According to Rapids defender Scott Palguta, much of that credit goes to Mastroeni was back in the lineup after National Team duty earlier.  “All the credit there goes to Pablo.  He’s a ball-winner in the air, really tenacious, and played (Gomez) out of the game pretty early.  You have to respect Christian because of his high skill level, but Pablo was in his shorts for 90 minutes.  Once he sets the tone in there guys lose interest.” 

Defensively, the tandem of Cory Gibbs and Palguta in the middle stepped up and fairly easily thwarted most DC chances at a comeback.  “Cory and I want to stay at home and try not to get dragged out to the side too much and keep our shape.  If we do that, we should be strong enough in the air with a solid goalkeeper behind us to deal with stuff that comes in,” said Palguta.

“When the ball got out wide we were pretty organized.  The communication between me and Cory was there, and Ugo and Jordan (Harvey) were always tucked around in good spots for balls that were being swung in.”   

Smith summed up the night and his feelings which he were explicitly positive.  “I’m absolutely delighted with 3 points.  We’ve started off a run of home games with a win, we kept a clean sheet, we’ve closed the gap with 4 games in-hand.”

“Was it our best performance?-no.  But then we’ve played very well and not gotten full points.  Somewhere in-between is the happy medium.  We are doing some good things.  When they’re not playing well there’s a lot to the other side of their game.  I always felt that would be the determining factor because we played well at the time.”

Peak Performers:

Omar Cummings-Executed brilliant finishes to open both halves, caused problems all night for DC, then played provider so well on final goal it was a gimme for Clark.

Matt Pickens-Made the scoreline look easy with 5 saves, none of which were routine.

Scott Palguta-He was always in perfect position to snuff out any threats breaking down the middle leaving DC with few good looks through the run of play.