The teething woes of FC Dallas coach Schellas Hyndman continued in the suburb of Frisco Thursday when his inexperienced team lost 1-0 at home to Colorado Rapids. If it’s any consolation, once you’ve lost at home to the Rapids, things usually can’t get any worse.
“The one potential positive for FC Dallas could be that if the team is going to be bad, at least it’ll be bad but young,” writes Tobias Xavier Lopez following the defeat, which dropped the team to fifth place in the western conference. Hyndman dropped the team’s leading assist scorer Andre Rocha after the latter had complained midweek about being substituted too often. Inserting Bruno Guarda (second career start), Anthony Wallace (fifth start) and Michael Dello-Russo (second start) into the midfield didn’t help, and they “struggled to hold possession.”
“The bigger picture is still trying to get into the playoffs,” Hyndman said. “I think we’ve bumped our toe a little bit in the last two games because those are games we could have won.” His mantra remains “do as I ask or you won’t play,” Lopez reports. Hyndman said the Rocha case was “an internal matter,” but later conceded that the absence of Rocha, as well as Duilio Davino and Victor Sikora (both injured) meant there had been something missing on the field. “You put those three players on the field, could we be a more experienced, talented team? I think so. So hopefully we can get those players thinking right and healthy.”