The Newest Coach Prevails

You have to give DCU some props for making it interesting and coming back to tie things up after being down 2-0 at half-time. But they were still down 3-2 in the series and lost out in the end. Both teams had new coaches with DC's Tom Soehn in his first full year as a head coach. Juan Carlos Osorio only had the last half of the season to turn Chicago around and get them into the play-offs. Major League Soccer Talk has a couple good points about managerial mistakes Soehn made that contributed to them losing the series. On the flip side, fans who watched the series should now be able to see that one of the most important things for Chicago bringing in a new coach was that Osorio was able to lure Wilman Conde to the Fire. Without Conde's presence in the back the Fire wouldn't have progressed in the play-offs. He only had 7 games at the end of the season to start to adjust to living the US and to his teammates. That may have been just enough time to work out some kinks and be ready to raise the MLS Cup on November 18th.