Match Report: Vancouver Whitecaps 0 - DC United 1

• Goals scored: Neagle 61' (penalty)
• What happened: Vancouver dominated the match almost from start to finish-- they hit the crossbar and goalpost multiple times but could not score. DC were awarded a questionable penalty early in the second half and scored. Vancouver were awarded a penalty late in second half stoppage time-- Cristian Techera's kick hit the post.
• Who sang the national anthems: A child
• Players in today's match that I recognized because they used to play for the Seattle Sounders: Fredy Montero and Sebastian Le Toux (Update-- According to my friend Michael, DC United goalscorer Lamar Neagle is a native of Federal Way, WA and former Sounder as well. Additionally, Michael says that his wife of many years has always had a crush on Neagle.)
• Question I had while watching the match: How do the Tyranno-Vision screen and Roof Opening Apparatus (pictured below) not fall down on to the field and crush the players?

• Other question I had while watching the match: How does one get a job on the Stretcher Crew (pictured below-- the four guys in white vests)? 

• Final questions I had while watching the match: Why did they water the pitch at halftime if it is artificial? Or was the truck that drove around spreading sand instead?
• How we got tickets: Free from friends
• Where the teams were in the MLS standings coming into the match: Vancouver-- mid-table in the Western Conference; DC United-- bottom of the the Eastern Conference
• Things the Vancouver fans did not like: The officiating, especially after Neagle converted the penalty kick for DC United (video below)

•  Things that disappointed the Vancouver fans: Techera missing the potentially equalizing penalty kick in stoppage time (video below)

• What this match teaches us: They still play the Vancouver Whitecaps Anthem before games.

Forty years ago today-- the Sex Pistols release "God Save The Queen"

Sometime during the 1979-80 school year, when I was eleven or twelve, my older brother returned home from college in Colorado, where he was a freshman and hating it. When he’d gone off in the fall, Clark had had shoulder-length hair and was listening to the Marshall Tucker Band, the Eagles, and the Who; when he came back home, his hair was half an inch long, and he was wearing cracked mirrored sunglasses and an amused snarl. One day during his visit, Clark told me I needed to call the KSHE Radio request line and ask for a particular song to be played. At the time (and probably to this day), KSHE played “Real Rock Radio” and was where white St. Louis went to hear Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Charlie Daniels, Steely Dan, and Yes—it was, at my brother’s insistence throughout high school, the only radio station we ever listened to on family car trips. Now here was Clark wanting me to call up these arbiters of dinosaur rock taste and request some song with bad words in it he'd heard about while away at college. As the younger brother who always wanted to be included in any mischief and mayhem, I was eager to comply.

I’m not sure I actually remember placing the phone call, so I always imagine my fingers shaking as I dialed and my voice cracking as I asked the man who answered the phone on the other end of the line, “Can you play ‘God Save the Queen’ by the Sex Pistols?” But I have no trouble recalling his response— he quickly shouted “Fuck you!” and crashed the phone down. Needless to say, I was thrilled—what powers had I just unleashed? What was this music that made grown men cuss out little kids over the phone just for requesting it? I hadn’t even heard the song yet, but I knew was hooked.