LAFC wins first-ever home game, D.C. United & Washington Spirit results, and more: Freedom Kicks for 4/30/2018

Good morning folks! I’m stepping in for Ryan, bringing Friday’s weirdness to the start of the week.

I might do things differently from Ryan, but I won’t short you on the traditional recap roud-up. Here’s Steven Streff on D.C. United’s extremely disappointing loss from Saturday (worst performance of 2018 IMO), reactions from players and Ben Olsen, perspectives from our brethren at The Brotherly Game, a report from Pro Soccer USA, the league site, and Steve Goff at the Washington Post.

Here’s another bummer: Philly, after doing worse than their expected goals in every game this season, out-performed that metric for the first time against United. Great. Good.

(deep, exhausted sigh)

OK, let’s talk about something that went a little better. The Washington Spirit overcame the return of Sam Kerr and a late storm (literally, the weather got ugly late) to hang on for a draw against the Chicago Red Stars. Caitlin Buckley wrote our story from Boyds (and we’ll have another piece from her today about this one), our friends from Hot Time In Old Town had their say, as did the good folks at Follow Your Spirit and WaPo.

Worth noting: Francisca Ordega has scored in three straight, and after the last two she’s given us the two best goal celebrations in DC soccer in 2018:

RSC Anderlecht beat Royal Charleroi 3-1 in the Belgian league’s final stage/playoff/complicated group thing. Why do we bring it up? Andy Najar started at right wingback, playing 67 minutes:

Washington to be inducted into Maryland Soccer Hall of Fame | RUHighlanders.com
Some of you Olds may remember Dante Washington with RSL, or the Dallas Burn, or (most likely) the Columbus Crew. Some of you Real Olds probably cheered for him at the Capital Centre as a member of the Washington Warthogs in the Continental Indoor Soccer League. Washington also represented the U.S. at the 1992 Olympics and scored against Mexico with the USMNT.

I feel ancient. Anyway, congrats to one of the good guys!

Speaking of familiar names in local soccer, Spirit goalkeeper coach Nicci Wright and former United midfielder Marcelo Sarvas will be coaching DA teams for Arlington Soccer, while current Spirit goalkeeper DiDi Haracic will be Arlington’s goalkeeper coach and former Spirit defender Candace Chapman will assist on the girls side:

Speaking of former former Spirit players, Stephanie Labbe’s push to play for a PDL team continues, as she suited up for Calgary Foothills FC against FC Edmonton yesterday:

Speaking of...uh, things involving people in green, here’s one way to be a wealthy eccentric:

Let’s look at yesterday’s MLS games:

Game Recap: Orlando City 2, Colorado Rapids 1 | Burgundy Wave
Orlando City vs. Colorado Rapids: Final Score 2-1 as Lions Come Back Again | The Mane Land
I don’t think Orlando City is actually legitimately good, but they do have 5 straight wins.

New York City 3, FC Dallas 1 - as it happened | Hudson River Blue
FC Dallas falls to New York City FC 3-1 for first loss of 2018 | Big D Soccer
I do think NYCFC is legitimately good, and they did what good teams do by comfortably handling a previously unbeaten FC Dallas in the Bronx.

Unbelievable! LAFC 1, Seattle Sounders 0 | Angels on Parade
Sounders at LAFC, quick recap: Ciman scores dead ball goal to beat Seattle | Sounder at Heart
Seattle did more than enough to take a point against Los Angeles FC, but Laurent Ciman’s powerful, knuckling free kick made a fool of Stefan Frei, who got two hands to it but still saw it go past him for a 93rd minute game-winner. Our friend Alicia Rodriguez, getting to cover LAFC’s first-ever home game after Angels on Parade went 1,282 days without an MLS home game to cover, was pleased:

Can Bobby Wood and Hamburg pull off a great escape? | Stars and Stripes FC
Bobby Wood hadn’t scored a goal since August, but with Hamburg staring relegation right in the face (they might need to win both of their remaining games to have any chance of staying in the Bundesliga), he stepped up and converted from the penalty spot to give his team a 1-0 lead.

Iniesta says he would like this ‘to never end’ as Barcelona win La Liga | Barca Blaugranes
Andres Iniesta and FC Barcelona are champions of La Liga, and the little genius is understandably emotional about it.

OK, I’m out of links. Don’t let Monday get you down, friends.