If you were to describe Saturday's match between Sporting Kansas City and Minnesota United with a movie title, one good choice could be "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest." Another (courtesy of Steve Brisendine) could be " It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World," or maybe "The Gods Must Be Crazy."
To give you an idea of just how crazy this game was, Sporting had 17 shots in the first half (five on target), six were from outside the 18. MNUFC had one shot from outside the 18, but it wasn't on target.
The goal giving SKC the 1-0 lead at halftime came from defender Ike Opara and could only be described as a worm-burner from distance. Before taking the shot, it appeared that Opara took a look around and decided, "Why not?" He wound up from about 30 yards out and the ball was never more than a few inches off the ground as it passed a flat-footed Bobby Shuttleworth. Shuttleworth still hadn't moved when the ball came back out of the net and hit him on the left hand.
There were five yellow cards in the first half, but none in the second. The weird thing would be that both goalkeepers were given yellows. In the 43rd minute, Shuttleworth is booked for time wasting. When you're given a yellow for time wasting, that's one thing. When you get it in the first half, that's just stupid, especially when you have already been warned.
Just over a minute later, Tim Melia was shown yellow for dissent after asking referee Jorge Gonzalez to show a yellow card for a MNUFC foul. Gonzalez showed yellow all right, but to Melia instead.
The weirdness continued in the 54th minute. Soony Saad put a shot off the underside of the crossbar that appeared to bounce behind the goal line. No goal was signaled, so Jimmy Medranda followed up and headed home the rebound. With goal-line technology, Saad would have scored his first of the season, but as it stands, Medranda got his first of the campaign.
Not to take anything away from his accomplishment, but another weird event would have to be Saad Abdul-Salaam scoring the first goal of his career. Gerso Fernandes put the ball across the face of goal, where second half sub Dom Dwyer attempted to toe-poke it into the back of the net. Shuttleworth saved that shot, but the rebound came straight to Abdul-Salaam, who popped it in in the 87th minute.
The win extended the club's home unbeaten streak to 16, and the announced attendance of 20,361 marked the 94th consecutive MLS sellout at Children's Mercy Park. At least some things are still normal in Kansas City
Next up for the club is a home match against the Montreal Impact. Kickoff is set for 7:00 on Saturday, June 10th.
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