Colorado Rapids vs. Toronto FC: Three Questions With Waking The Red

Colorado and Toronto meet only a single time every season with the new unbalanced schedule, so they will be making their first foray into Dick's Sporting Goods Park since mid-2011 this weekend. (That game ended in an incredibly boring 0-0 draw. You may remember it as one of the string of ties we had in the doldrums of late spring and early summer, setting that awful record of most ties in a row by an MLS team. Ick.)

You can check out my answers to their Rapids-centric questions over at their site, my questions to them are below. Read on!

WtR: I'd say yes and no to the actually happening question, though Nelsen has definitely had a positive influence (almost wrote impact there, shudder). Right now, Toronto's squad is desperately poor, but they're being coached to the level of a competitively poor team, which is an upgrade on the shambles that was last season with a better team on paper. The next step is to improve the squad and then we'll see if Nelsen's good enough to coach a more expansive attacking game successfully.

Through a more defensive focus, high pressing and clogging up the middle, TFC have become tough to break down. There's not enough quality in midfield to create good chances, but Robert Earnshaw had a great start to the season, masking those deficiencies a bit with his opportunism so for the first few games, they didn't look like all that bad of a team. Take away the injury time goals and we could have a few more points, and we would have deserved them, and that was despite a tough schedule so far.

But, Earnshaw has cooled off a bit, and injuries have hit us (and TFC do not have depth right now) and so right now we're looking pretty rugged with a few poor games recently, capped off with a 6-0 defeat to Montreal on Wednesday night. They'd let in result altering goals in injury time in 3 straight games, then followed it with that thrashing so mentally, the team has to be a bit beat up right now that is very much there for the taking.

BW: How has the obviously jaded TFC fanbase reacted in general to all of the new front office moves from Nelsen onward?

It's going to be another long season, we've all more or less accepted that and the supporters seem willing to give Nelsen enough time. Importantly, for the first time now we seem to have a front office that will show the same patience. However sick of this team we might get at times, supporters can at least cling to the hope that there's a proper long term plan now that will actually have a chance to come to fruition.

BW: There has clearly been some big roster turnover since last we met, are there any new names that I should be keeping my eye on in this match that I may not have heard of before?

WtR: Well hopefully there'll be TFC's new young DP, Argentinian Matias Laba. He's officially signed up and travelled with the team to watch the game in Montreal, but doesn't have his international transfer certificate as of the time of writing. If that arrives before Saturday, expect to see him play a part. He's not going to be the type of DP that takes the league by storm though, he's a defensive midfielder, more adventurously described as a box to box midfielder, but either way, he's not going to be scoring goals or anything like that. Osvaldo Alsonso is the standard most people are hoping he can achieve and he could eventually be one good piece of an overall improved team.

BW: Lineup and score prediction of your own?

WtR: Injuries are taking their toll, so this is assuming that none of the walking wounded are declared fit, and I'll guess that Laba's ITC won't be ready in time. Anyway, from right to left, and with a diamond midfield, I'll guess at the following.

Prediction: Rapids weather an early push, then get a fairly early goal and cruise home adding a 2nd late in the game for a 2-0 home win.

Thanks again to Duncan at Waking The Red, make sure to head over there for everything you've ever wanted to know and more about Toronto FC.