Joe Willis started tonight in goal as D.C. United collected its third win of the season. In August. Yuk.
But never mind that for now; we’ve been hammering the poor old, awful Black and Red all year.
For now, let’s stick to what’s interesting, and what is working well around RFK. We already told you about Luis Silva, and how his arrival in a swell trade from Toronto is paying big dividends, as it did in Saturday’s 2-1 win over Montreal.
But are we seeing a change in goal at RFK? Maybe … but it’s a little early to say for certain. Here are the facts:
Bill Hamid has been D.C. United’s starter for three seasons, and his ongoing string of invitations into U.S. national team camp (although generally in apprentice roles) makes the future around United’s No. 1 appear consisently sunny. He does make some swell saves, but his decision making can be unreliable, and he has allowed some softies this year, too.
(MORE: United snaps winning streak with win over Montreal)
Backup ‘keeper Joe Willis has generally been solid. United manager Ben Olsen has already said that Willis will be in goal during the team’s important U.S. Open Cup semifinal Wednesday. Scratch that “important” and make it “absolutely critical,” because United is way too far behind in the MLS playoff chase, so the Open Cup represents United’s only chance of salvaging something from this little lost puppy dog of a season.
Hamid has been the Open Cup goalkeeper, so maybe we cannot read too much into that. Then again, listen to what Olsen said after Saturday’s match about playing Willis over Hamid, who was back from Gold Cup duty in plenty of time and was on the substitute’s bench during the win over Montreal.
“Joe [Willis] got us into the Open Cup semifinals and I’m going to play him on Wednesday – I’ll tell you right now,” Olsen said. “It has nothing to do against Bill [Hamid] and the faith that we have in him. I wanted to get Joe one more game going into Wednesday. And I thought he had a pretty good game.”
