Rapids vs. Galaxy – Three Keys to the Game

It's very unlikely that they'll be able to catch up to LA even if they win out the rest of their games, but the only chance they'll have is if they can beat LA twice in their final few games. The harder task will likely be the game at the HDC, but can the Rapids take the win? Stranger things have happened…

Don't Overthink, Oscar – I mentioned in my tactics article a few days back that Oscar Pareja showed a lot of tactical maturity in his second game against Portland. The question is, can he do it again? Pareja has had very many frustrating performances as manager this season, at least tactically and especially on the road.

All mistakes, and hopefully all mistakes that he has learned from. Pareja is going against a legendary coach in Bruce Arena, and if he tries to outsmart Bruce he's going to get burned. Hopefully he'll take a look at what worked against Portland and what worked in the first LA game and craft a gameplan and roster based on that.

Thomas had 110 successful passes and only nine unsuccessful ones since he started playing games for Colorado, unbelievable numbers for a guy who was supposed to be suffering fitness issues. His coverage of Juninho especially will be important — he has burned the Rapids by being left completely unmarked in the center of the field before. If Hendry wants to earn a long term contract, these will be the games that he shows he deserves one in.

Go For Broke – Colorado has actually played better against LA at the Home Depot Center in recent years than at Dick's Sporting Goods Park. Why is that? Nobody knows for sure. Perhaps they put in that tiny extra bit of work at LA, since the games always seem to be ones with big playoff implications. (The 3-1 win in 2010 comes to mind, as does the hard-fought 1-0 loss there last season.) So how can you channel that into Friday's match? Just go for broke.