Galaxy Gets a Leg Up, 3-0

Coach Glenn Myernick doesn’t think his team is snakebit.

So what else do you call a club that has played 589 minutes of soccer without scoring a single goal?

Unlucky?

Hapless?

One game away from elimination in Major League Soccer’s Western Conference playoffs?

Because that’s where Myernick’s Colorado Rapids find themselves today after being comprehensively beaten, 3-0, by the Galaxy in front of 16,307 at the Rose Bowl on Sunday.

Summing up the Rapids’ frustrations was one play late in the game. Forward Paul Bravo found himself with the ball a few yards from the net and with only Galaxy goalkeeper Kevin Hartman to beat.

Hartman went left. The ball went right . . . and caught the keeper on the ankle, deflecting wide. End of threat.

“I don’t know if that’s snakebit, that’s good goalkeeping,” said Myernick, who has had to endure seeing his team shut out for six games in a row.

“If we had been hitting the crossbar, and the goalkeepers had been making saves like that on a regular basis, and we’re hitting the woodwork, and we’re just shooting wide, then I’d be the first to say, ‘Guys, we’re snakebit.’

“But they’re professionals. I can’t pull the wool over their eyes. They know that leading up to the playoffs we’ve not created enough quality chances. Today, we did. I mean, we could have won the game, 5-3. We had five clear chances in front of the goal with only the goalkeeper to beat. And nothing to show for it.”

Not so the Galaxy.

Goals by Ezra Hendrickson, Greg Vanney and Cobi Jones gave Los Angeles a deserved victory and a one-game lead in the best-of-three series. And it came on a day when the team had to play a man short for more than an hour after midfielder Simon Elliott was red-carded for an alleged foul on Marcelo Balboa in the 18th minute.

There didn’t appear to be any intentional contact. But unlike the Rapids’ players, referee Marcel Yonan could have the wool pulled over his eyes. There were other examples all afternoon.

“I reserve all comments on the refereeing,” said Galaxy Coach Sigi Schmid. “Normally, when a player gets red-carded, I’m upset with that player because a lot of times it’s a dumb foul. I can’t be upset with Simon Elliott.

“There were other fouls on the field that were harder than he committed. Maybe we don’t act as well.”

Added Elliott: “Balboa milked it for all it was worth. Players do that [make fouls look worse than they are], but the referee has got to see it for what it is.”

Countered Myernick: “He [Elliott] already had nailed somebody from behind earlier on.”

Whether the ejection--on the basis of two yellow cards--was deserved or not, the crowd certainly rewarded Balboa for his performance. For more than an hour, the fans booed him every time he touched the ball.

“I loved it,” Elliott said. “I was doing a lot worse than that, I can tell you. No, it was fantastic. It’s great the way the crowd got behind the team.”

Almost as great as the way Hendrickson got behind the Rapids’ for the Galaxy’s opening goal, off a superb left-to-right diagonal pass from Mauricio Cienfuegos in the eighth minute.

“It was a great ball from Cien,” Hendrickson said. “I don’t know how he saw me because he was on the left side and I was making a blind side run on the right. But he was able to pick me out and play me through. By the time I got to the ball, the defense had caught up, but by then I already had picked where I wanted to place the ball. I just kept it low because he’s a tall keeper.”

Indeed, the 6-foot-6 Ian Feuer couldn’t get down in time and the Galaxy had the lead. Colorado created a flurry of chances late in the first half but Hartman handled them with ease.

Vanney doubled the lead in the 52nd minute, scoring on a penalty kick. A fine back-heel pass by Jones put Cienfuegos free, Colorado defender Chris Martinez grabbed the Salvadoran’s jersey, holding him back, and referee Yonan, who red-carded Elliott, at least got this call correct.

The third goal came five minutes later following some excellent play by Clint Mathis, who got to the end line then cut the ball back across the face of the net. Feuer lost track of it, perhaps distracted by defender Jason Bent, who was trying to mark Jones.

The ball squirted free as Feuer scrambled for it and Jones sprinted in and poked it onto the open net for his first playoff goal in four seasons.

Another, in Denver next Sunday, might be all it takes to finish off the--OK, not snakebit--venomless Rapids.