Galaxy Feels the Heat When Calls Don’t Go L.A.’s Way

Major League Soccer games, like coaches’ opinions, often turn on a single play.

Take Wednesday night’s 3-0 Galaxy loss at the Cotton Bowl, for example. It took only one play for Los Angeles Coach Octavio Zambrano and Dallas Burn Coach Dave Dir to come away with decidedly different thoughts on the match.

Zambrano believed referee Kevin Terry and his linesmen had blown a crucial call. Dir thought Terry had blown calls all night, but had gotten that one correct.

The incident occurred in the 33rd minute. A pass from Dallas forward Jason Kreis found teammate Mickey Trotman alone behind the Galaxy defense, with only goalkeeper Kevin Hartman to beat.

Galaxy defender Robin Fraser sprinted back, collided with Trotman on the edge of the penalty area and sent the Burn forward sprawling. Fraser was immediately red-carded by Terry, who called it a tackle from behind.

After that, it was no match. Playing short-handed in 100-degree heat and with no support from the sparse crowd of 9,720, a loss for the Galaxy (16-6) seemed all but assured.

But the loss upset Zambrano less than the poor officiating.

“It looked to me like he [Trotman] was offside by about four or five yards,” he said, adding that failure to spot the infraction had changed the face of the game.

“If there is one excuse, that’s the only one,” Zambrano said.

Dir, meanwhile, begged to differ.

“I would have to see the tape, but I would disagree,” he said. “In fact, if anything, they were definitely getting the national team calls that we weren’t getting.

“I felt like we were on the road. I could name four other things that went their way that shouldn’t have gone their way. He [Terry] was handing out yellow cards [to Dallas] tonight like they were going out of style, while they were making clear tackles from behind [and not being called].”

National team calls?

“That’s where a guy who has a little more respect screams, and he gets the call because he’s a guy that they [referees] know and is a good player,” Dir explained. “It’s like the calls Michael Jordan gets. It’s just part of the business. Nobody is trying to do it on purpose.

“It’s part of the game. It’s not the referees’ fault. It’s in every sport, in every game. But they [the Galaxy] have plenty of those [recognized players] and I don’t have any.”

Fraser, who is going through a lean spell after scoring an own goal in the Galaxy’s 1-0 loss to Washington D.C. United on Saturday at the Rose Bowl, thought the non-call was ludicrous.

“He [Trotman] was so offside it wasn’t even debatable,” Fraser said. “He was so far ahead that all I was trying to do was get behind Kevin [Hartman, allowing the keeper to challenge Trotman], because I figured [Trotman] would either try to shoot or go the other way.

“But he cut across my path and I was going so fast I couldn’t stop. We just collided. I don’t really have any argument with the red card for the tackle from behind. But it should never have got to that point.”

The point it has gotten to is that the Galaxy has lost three in a row and has been shut out in each of its last two games. The top-scoring team in the league has been blanked for more than three hours.

Dallas (11-11) put the Galaxy on the ropes early, scoring in the sixth minute.

A cross came in from the left, Dante Washington’s header was headed away by Galaxy defender Steve Jolley but the ball rolled out to Mark Santel on the right. Santel’s pass found Kreis, who reacted quicker than the L.A. defense and rocketed a shot into the lower right corner of the Galaxy net.

Fraser’s ejection later in the half reduced the Galaxy’s options. Although the team played well and created numerous scoring opportunities, it was unable to beat Mark Dodd in the Dallas goal.

Goals by Trotman in the 52nd minute and by Washington in the 71st were the seemingly inevitable result of L.A. playing short-handed.

But had the offside flag been raised on that one play, it might all have been different.