Next Game: Wednesday, March 31, 2021 3:00PM ET

I lost my wallet on Monday and as stupid as this sounds this was the most valuable thing in there. If anyone has an extra one they would be willing to sell it would mean a lot since it's because of Audi Field that I fell in love with soccer. There's one going over $112 on eBay but it would be nice to pay just a tad less for that.

The summer of promotions has begun.

With season ticket sales driven up by messi and resulting in a flooded resale market, you can expect the club to do more promos with cheaper prices than ever before.

Anyone else going to the game in Fort launderdale this weekend? Where are you sitting? I'm trying not to get stabbed

This won't be a United game, but instead the USA vs Scotland rugby on July 12th at 6:30pm. I've never been there and am hoping to get some suggestions of shaded seating sections at Audi Field? Thanks in advance.

DCU 1 - 4 NYRB

Dude is trash

The pitch looks absolutely atrocious. Can't wait for the Defenders season to be over.

Anyone have bad seats and would like to sit in section F for tonight? I have 3 tickets I’ll send you.

Field looks not good.

Friend got sick and had to bail, so I've got a spare in 130 for any DC fan who is broke but wants to go. Shoot me a DM.

Seems like salaries have leaked: https://www.reddit.com/r/SoundersFC/comments/1cstm4w/2024_mls_salaries_released/

Discuss below. It's mostly what we expected but the big reveal for me is Peltola's surprisingly low salary. At least based on this year's salary (might escalate later?) Peltola could be easily converted to a TAM player to free up the third DP slot. It's not like we're really going to get three high-fee U22 players...

Would like to take my girl to the game to celebrate her graduation from Georgetown. Thanks in advance!

Going to my first game at Audi Field tonight and have heard the best option is usually to take metro rather than drive and try to find parking. Looking at maps though the stadium seems about equidistant from the Waterfront and Navy Yard stations. Is there one people usually use over the other? Good pregame food in the area? Any safety concerns about the area/the walk?

Haven't been down to Audi Field in ages, going tonight. That area's been developed so much, what are the best places to get some beers before the game. Also anything equivalent to Lot 8 vibe from RFK??

Let me know if you are interested. Section 119, Row 4. Would sell them through the TicketMaster app.

I go to a lot of UFL/DCU games at Audi. Why is parking so high? Is their any off street spots to park near? Or cheaper lots. Even at commanders games yall parking prices be shot out.

That is all

This year has been awesome. Haven’t remembered a year in a long time where I legitimately think they will keep it competitive every game. I like Lesesne, watching his press conferences each week have been fantastic. He’s very well spoken about his strategy and there’s no doubt this team has an identity. His team has fully bought in and it shows.

I always felt watching DCU that we had so many guys that just didn’t seem to care that much. Herrara, Peltola and Stroud have been great value signings. They are true pros and we severely lacked enough guys like that in the last few years.

Overall, just excited to watch the games each week and not dreading them like before!

Goff just reported that, in a move I think needed to happen, DC United have loaned Matai Akinmboni to Loudoun United. Hopefully that means he gets some minutes, which he desperately needs.

https://twitter.com/SoccerInsider/status/1790478200717365530

Last week I was talking about how Troy Lesesne was trying to find a way to keep the team from wilting in the second halves of games. I worried it might not be possible with the somewhat messed-up roster, but it feels like some progress has been made.

In this game, instead of waiting patiently for DC United to wilt, Pineda subbed off a winger (Edwin Mosquera) at halftime and subbed on Dax McCarty to reinforce a midfield battle that Klich and Hopkins had been winning in the first half. I didn’t check to see if this happened at the half, but certainly after the third goal, Lesesne pulled the team back into a low block and defended in a 5-4-1 instead of a 5-3-2, leaving Benteke as a lone high outlet. This slowed down DC’s offense but successfully denied Atlanta much in the way of chances. Lesesne put Pirani on for Stroud in the 73rd minute, both for fresh legs and perhaps because Pirani is—at least theoretically—better than Stroud at holding on to the ball while outnumbered and finding a pass under pressure. This didn’t pay off with a goal, but he did help generate a few shots, which lately have been few and far between after halftime.

I wanted to see if I could validate my fuzzy sense of improvement with some objective stats. We’re twelve games into the season, so maybe we can see some trends. Note that I normally use FBref, but for this I’m using Fotmob stats because they let me filter by half.

The first question is do the stats even confirm the eye test that this is a real issue?

Answer: yes. Kind of.

DC’s overall goal difference:

• Overall: 0
• Second halves: -3

Expected goal difference (DC’s xG minus opposing team xG):

• Overall: +2.06
• Second halves: -0.43

Big chance difference (DC’s “big chance” stat minus the opposition’s “big chance” stat):

• Overall: +4
• Second halves: -1

So this seems like a significant effect. My first thought was it doesn’t seem as big as I would have thought, but it’s worth noting that DC’s overall xG difference is 4th best in the league. Their second half xG difference, if it were the team’s overall, would be near the bottom of the eastern conference.

What about the trend? I tried looking at trends by looking at stats like xG and big chances based on the percentage DC had in the second half, but those charts didn’t tell the story I wanted them to tell seemed either too noisy or too impacted by the game state. I think the best view is just second half xG difference, so here that is game-by-game:

https://preview.redd.it/k8l2v4fsdf0d1.png?width=721&format=png&auto=webp&s=1726fcb05e73a7eaca197cc71be0fd07b1f2790d

Overall, you’ve got to like that trend over the past four games! Although it looks more dramatic because of how terrible that NYCFC game was. Also, it’s worth noting that the Orlando City game involved a brutal collapse on the scoresheet but doesn’t look so bad in xG terms.

Here’s the same thing broken out so you can see our xG and xG allowed in the second halves of each game:

https://preview.redd.it/pb1wpywudf0d1.png?width=712&format=png&auto=webp&s=5cb4851458a2d1401193ebf9290658394902d412

My big takeaway is that we should try not to get crushed like in the Inter Miami and NYCFC games. Instead, we should do the crushing, like we did against New England and Portland. How’s that for hard-hitting analysis?

Finally, let’s look at DC’s xG difference in each half:

https://preview.redd.it/k8z6c38xdf0d1.png?width=716&format=png&auto=webp&s=18f9ef4f6f41cfd5203dfec6865d6565df201af6

From this, you can see there’s been several games with clear meltdowns: St. Louis City, CF Montreal, and Seattle. And a few where DC was a bit worse: New England, Cincinnati, NYCFC, and Philadelphia. Portland was the one really big turnaround, but Columbus and Atlanta were both improvements.

As always with soccer stats, this is mostly a matter of entertainment and not scientific truth, but I’ll keep an eye on things as we go forward.

See my full game writeup for more from the Atlanta game, including player ratings, Ted Ku-Dipietro leading all MLS players in a silly stat, and more.

According to both a team report and Steven Goff, Conner Antley is out for the remainder of the season after tearing his left ACL at the end of the Atlanta match.

Tight competition for second place in the Black and Red boot race.

Anyone looking to get rid of one ticket for wednesdays game? I’d much rather purchase from someone directly vs line a ticket resellers pockets.

Edit: I HAVE FOUND ONE THANK YOU ALL!