Maximiliano Urruti has the face of a man who enjoys scoring ridiculous goals. (Photo credit: Olivia Brestal)
FC Dallas extended their home unbeaten streak to 18 after coming back to draw against Sporting Kansas City Saturday night in a wild, barn-storming, Texas-style shootout over the final 26 minutes of the match.
The home team came out in force and were pressuring for most of the first 20 minutes of the match. The best chance in that spell came from Maximiliano Urruti in the 17th minute. Mauro Diaz’s through ball found Michael Barrios behind the defense on the left side of the field. Barrios played a great cross to a wide open Urruti, but Alec Kann came out to smother the attempt.
Great goalkeeping was the name of the game in the first half and Chris Seitz was called into action on a Kansas City corner in the 23rd minute. Dom Dwyer met Graham Zusi’s cross to head the ball toward goal and Seitz got down low to his right to keep the ball out of the net.
Not even a minute later, Kann was making yet another great save after Victor Ulloa found himself with room to shoot from the top of the 18 yard box. Ike Opara would go down injured on the play as he tried to clear the ball and had to be replaced in the 36th minute of the game by Kevin Ellis.
The great goalkeeping kept going into the second half with Kann making a double save on Walker Zimmerman’s header and pushing the Atiba Harris followup off his near post in the 52nd minute.
As the shots kept mounting, however, the deadlock would be broken. Tesho Akindele was subbed into the match in the 60th minute and made an immediate impact, heading a cross from Atiba Harris past Kann in the 66th minute.
Tesho celebrates his opening goal. (Photo credit: Dylan Nadwodny)
Tesho’s goal only seemed to open the floodgates. Two minutes later Dom Dwyer scored the equalizer. Seitz believed Davis was shooting and had gone down to make the save to his right. However, Dwyer got a touch on the ball and took it the other direction. Dwyer showed his clinical finishing as he dispatched the ball into the roof of the net, giving Seitz no chance to make the save as he was moving back into position.
Five minutes later it was Dom Dwyer again, pouncing on a botched clearance by Walker Zimmerman and putting the ball into the bottom corner to get the go ahead goal.
FC Dallas were not going to let their unbeaten streak die on this Texas evening, and it was the man who only scores amazing goals, Urruti, who found the way to equalize in the 76th minute. This is a must see goal and celebration.
FC Dallas almost completed the victory when Akindele chipped Kann in the 81st minute, but that shot bounced just wide of the right hand post. The draw certainly seemed like a fair result especially considering how FC Dallas was coming into the match on short rest from their overtime, US Open Cup semifinal victory against LA Galaxy on Thursday.
After the match, Oscar Pareja was very pleased with the effort of his team:
I could not praise my players enough after such a great game they played over the week. 120 minutes and then end up tonight with such energy and pushing the game that much. Playing with their heart. For me this means much more than anything….Unfortunately we lost our concentration in the next 10 minutes after we scored the first goal. And I want to say tonight, I’m not going to blame these guys. It has been an exhausting week.
FC Dallas have a full week to recover as they prepare for their next match away at Real Salt Lake on August 20th.
Lineups
FC Dallas (4-2-3-1, left to right): Chris Seitz – Maynor Figueroa, Matt Hedges, Walker Zimmerman, Atiba Harris – Victor Ulloa (Kellyn Acosta 53′), Carlos Gruezo (Ryan Hollingshead 74′) – Michael Barrios, Mauro Diaz (c), Getterson (Tesho Akindele 61′) – Maximiliano Urruti
Sporting Kansas City: (4-3-3, left to right): Alec Kann – Jimmy Medranda, Lawrence Olum, Ike Opara (Kevin Ellis 34′), Saad Abdul-Salaam – Emmanuel Appiah, Nuno Coelho (Paulo Nagamura 85′), Benny Feilhaber – Graham Zusi, Dominic Dwyer, Jacob Peterson (Brad Davis 66′)
