Chivas USA Takes a Hard Fall
The ups and downs of a Major League Soccer expansion franchise in its infancy were on full display at the Home Depot Center on Saturday night.
Carlos Ruiz was only too happy to exploit the growing pains of Chivas USA.
It was Ruiz’s penalty kick in the 85th minute that proved to be the winner for FC Dallas in its 3-1 victory over the Goats. It was also a loss for the Goats that proved costly with defender Ryan Suarez being carried off the field on a stretcher and goalkeeper Brad Guzan needing a lip full of stitches.
“All I can say is I’m very happy to come back to L.A. and score in the Home Depot Center with my new team,” said a sheepish Ruiz, who was traded from the Galaxy to Dallas (2-0-1) on March 30 after three years, a league most-valuable-player award and an MLS Cup title.
“This is a good team.”
Chivas was decidedly not. Neither was the attendance.
It was another late defensive collapse by Chivas that cost it at least a draw in front of 12,697 in the 27,000-seat stadium. This after it drew only 18,493 to its inaugural game two weeks earlier for an afternoon start. While the cheap seats, the ones in the end zone that go for $19, were nearly full and it was the most active section of the stadium, the $50 sideline seats were nearly empty.
Those that did show up saw a lackluster effort from Chivas (0-2-1), which has given up eight goals overall.
“That was clearly not our best outing, obviously,” Coach Thomas Rongen said. “We were never able to get it into second or third gear.”
Said defender Ezra Hendrickson: “That was just not good. All over the field was just bad.”
The lighthearted dinner bet between Chivas President Antonio Cue and Dallas President Greg Elliott -- a fish dinner because Ruiz is known as El Pescadito, or a goat stew because Chivas is goats in Spanish -- took a back seat to a nasty collision on the play that set up Ruiz’s game winner.
Ruiz was beating Suarez to a ball in the box and Suarez took him down in the box in front of an onrushing Guzan, Chivas USA’s 20-year-old rookie goalkeeper. The resultant crash between Suarez and Guzan -- the back of Suarez’s head hit Guzan in the mouth -- left Suarez briefly unconscious and prone on the ground. He was taken off the field on a stretcher.
Suarez, whose pregnant wife Julie is close to delivering the couple’s first child, had regained consciousness by the time he was carried from the field and his wife, who was at the match, rode with him to a hospital, where he was diagnosed with a concussion and was scheduled to undergo a scan on his head.
After a seven-plus-minute delay, Ruiz took the penalty kick awarded by referee Ricardo Valenzuela and when Guzan, who took “at least” 10 stitches, according to team spokesman Keegan Pierce, went to his right, Ruiz went to Guzan’s left.
Ruiz, celebrating his first goal with his new club, blew kisses to the jeering and whistling crowd.
Dallas scored in the 40th minute.
Ronnie O’Brien, settled about 30 yards out on the left wing, unleashed a curling shot that eluded Guzan and went in just inside the near post.
Chivas answered four minutes later.
With Ramon Ramirez just outside the box on the left side, he sent a ball into the middle of the box where forward Thiago Martins, the Brazilian who scored the first goal in franchise history last week at San Jose, strongly headed it past goalkeeper Scott Garlick.
Martins celebrated the first Chivas home goal by leaping into the stands with the fans.
“That’s my job, to score goals,” Martins said. “But that doesn’t exclude me [from blame]. We lost today; we lost as a team. It’s important to remember that it is a long season. It’s better that stuff is happening at the beginning than at the end.”
Dallas’ third goal came in injury time, when an unmarked Eddie Johnson, sitting at the top of the box, took a ball from O’Brien and quickly beat Guzan.
