HOUSTON – When does something become the norm? For Houston Dynamo FC, not winning has been the norm for the past 16 games. And it continued with their 2-0 loss to the Portland Timbers.
The Dynamo entered Friday’s match against the Portland Timbers with a will to win the game, but then the match started, and the determination was nowhere to be found. The Timbers struck first in the 15th minute, then doubled its lead five minutes later.
For a team that hasn’t sniffed a win in 105 days and that owns the franchise record for games without a win, the lackadaisical start to the game was puzzling, to say the least.
After the game, Adam Lundkvist admitted he was surprised by how lifeless the team started the game.
“I felt like the week leading up to this game everyone has been really determined to turn this around. I mean, we had this home stretch we’ve been really looking forward to being at home playing in front of our fans for a long while, and then just I mean I’m surprised that’s one way of putting it,” Lundkvist said. “I think I was more disappointed.”
Four of Houston’s last five games have been at BBVA Stadium, a place where teams used to rue playing during the hot and humid summer days, but those days are long gone. Case in point, Friday’s win by the Timbers is the clubs’ first-ever win in Houston.
Against Portland — and really for most of the previous 16 games — it came down to not finishing their opportunities in front of goal. In the 25th minute, a wide-open Tyler Pasher got a clean look at the goal, but his header went wide right. If he converts that opportunity, it changes the complexity of the game.
“The chances they [Portland] had, they put them away, and we struggled with that. We had 10 shots by halftime with no goals, and I think we had almost 20 by the end of the game with no goals,” Dynamo head coach Tab Ramos said.
“I am not satisfied with anything, and the fans are waiting for anything. I feel bad for the fans because they are cheering us on, and they are doing all they can, that’s for sure. But in the second half, the team tried, and unfortunately, we are not good in front of the goal right now.”
For Ramos, a decorated player in many clubs worldwide and the U.S. Men’s National Team, the winless-streak process has been unlike anything he’s ever experienced. Ramos can’t pinpoint a specific part of the winless streak that stands out as the worse, mentioning that it has all been bad.
“When you win games sometimes even when you don’t deserve to win it, that gives everyone confidence in working every day, and that has been the biggest challenge; lifting everyone’s spirit after not winning on the weekend,” Ramos said. “And that has been a challenge every week.”
Another challenge for the Dynamo (3-10-10, 19 points) has been playing a complete game, playing a solid 90 minutes with no small mistakes that significantly impact the game. Lundkvist believes if the team can play a solid 90 minutes, it will go a long way towards helping Houston get over the winless hump.
“I’m convinced because I know the players are here. The quality is here. The work effort is here,” Lundkvist said. “Everything is here we just have to pull ourselves together and get the job done.”
Where do the Dynamo go from here? Houston has 11 games left in the season, and the MLS Playoffs are a long gone destination for them, so the question becomes, what can the team salvage from this season. But Ramos wanted no part in looking back at the season.
“If we talk about the season, that means we’re throwing the season away. I’m not throwing the season away, that’s not how I feel, and I think the team went through a lot this year. We made the team a lot younger,” Ramos said.
“We brought in some players for what we could do. We made the team good, and obviously, we got Tyler (Pasher) from USL and Griffin (Dorsey) from Toronto. Toronto released him, and I knew him, and those are a couple of guys we brought in. Basically, for nothing. We’ve created a better foundation for the team, but again, what matters is results. Anything else we talk about is too much talking.”
Jesus Acevedo Jr. is the Editor-in-Chief of The Bayoucitian. He’s an award-winning bilingual journalist from Houston, TX. A graduate of the University of Houston, he has written for the Houston Chronicle, La Voz de Houston, MLSsoccer.com, and ProSoccerUSA.
Before becoming a journalist, Jesus spent his early 20s drumming his way across Houston with two bands — Shortcomings and InsertNameHere. The memories that Jesus made as a musician were the seeds that started the idea for the comedy, Houmans: The Series.