Sporting KC Drop Points; Draw Montreal 1-1.

If there's one thing Sporting Kansas City has been good at this season, especially at home, it's taking care of the ball. The careless giveaways last season led to dropped points, at home and on the road.

It's unfortunate, then, that a giveaway led to a Montreal equalizer late in the 2nd half. Midfielder Soni Mustivar's pass looked like it was intended for either Kevin Ellis or Tim Melia, but wasn't really towards either one. Second half substitute Matteo Mancosu ran onto the tweener, chipped it over Melia and into the back of the net in the 82nd minute.

There are a couple things that make a result like this disappointing/frustrating. First, Sporting KC controlled the vast majority of the possession. For the match, the home side had 66.1 percent of the ball (70 percent in the first half, 62.2 percent in the 2nd).

This was, though, a byproduct of the way Montreal came to play (or not play, as Peter Vermes would say in the post-game presser). The formation Montreal started the game with was a 5-4-1. When you come out in a formation like that, what you're saying to the other team is you'll be happy with a draw and you really don't care if you score. When Ignacio Piatti took Montreal's second shot in the 21st minute, it looked like he really didn't care if it went in or not. At least, I think that's fair, considering that it bounced on it's way into Melia's chest. In fact, four of Montreal's five first half shots came from outside the 18, but only two of the five were on target.

Sporting KC, on the other hand, had 10 shots in the first half, four on target, and half were inside the 18. With some better luck, they might have had at least two goals at halftime, if Dom Dwyer's shot in the 15th minute hadn't dented the crossbar. In fact, if they hadn't already taken down the goalposts, they might still be vibrating.

The other thing that makes it frustrating is that it seemed like Montreal had more of the possession after Chris Duvall picked up a straight red in the 86th minute. I don't have any numbers I can point to, but it just seemed that way. Now, Sporting did have the last three shots of the game, but they all came more than four minutes after the red card. They did almost manage a winner out of it, but the unfortunate keyword in that phrase is almost. And almost only counts in horseshoes, hand grenades and nuclear weapons.

The fortunate thing about a disappointing result like tonight is the team has another game on Wednesday, as Minnesota United comes in for a fourth round match-up in the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup. The two clubs last tangled on June 3rd, with Sporting KC coming away with the 3-0 victory. While it stands to reason the Loons will come in trying to prove they're a better team than they showed last time they were here, who really know what kind of changes coach Adrian Heath might have in store. Kickoff for the match is set for 7:30.