Monday Morning Fullbacking - Of Red Cards and Cheez Wiz

So that didn't go well (understatement). Let's start with the good : It could have been worse. Not only did the Philadelphia Union miss a chance or three in the opening half, Alec Kann, who's honestly been growing on me after what I felt was a pretty rocky start, made six saves, keeping Sporting in it.

The bad? Lot's of things. Even without getting into refereeing decisions, Sporting Kansas City did not have a good game across the board. While matching the Union fairly well on shots taken (10 to Philadelphia's 12), SKC only managed to put two of those on frame, whereas Philadelphia put Kann to work 8 times out of 12 (75%!), forcing him into the aforementioned above six saves. Finishing problems? Sounds familiar...

The ugly? The red cards. I'm not sure I want to talk about them much, especially Roger Espinoza's. If his card isn't rescinded, I'm going to eat a sandwich. I'm probably going to each a sandwich anyway, but at least now I sound threatening.

In short summary, refereeing decisions definitely did not help Sporting make a come back, but once calls had gone against them, they were already simply not playing well enough. There's always the argument to be made that that bending but not breaking, frustrating an opponent, and capitalizing on a mistake is a valid tactic, and I largely agree, but on Saturday night, that wasn't the case. Sporting drop a much needed road point and have the Houston Dynamo coming up next on Friday at home.

Let's look at some numbers.

Average at best for most of SKC, with a lot of guys just having sub-par games. Gotta hand it to Mr. Alberg, a goal and an assist in 26 minutes is pretty nifty.

Give man of the match to Kann (KAAAAAAAANNNN!!!!!) for at least not letting Philly go all DC on Chicago on us.