Photo by Jose L. Argueta/ISIphotos.com
By AVI CREDITOR
WASHINGTON - Charlie Davies played provider to Josh Wolff in the first half, and Wolff returned the favor in the second as both forwards scored to lift D.C. United to a 2-1 victory over the Seattle Sounders Wednesday night.
Andy Najar, who made his return to United's starting lineup, sprung the attack for both goals, which developed on nearly identical sequences.
Najar pounced on a Seattle mistake and played the ball wide to Davies, who beat Jhon Kennedy Hurtado with pace and slid a perfect cross through the box to Wolff. The veteran striker one-timed it past Kasey Keller in the 31st minute to open the scoring.
In the 52nd minute, Najar again played a through ball down the right, this time finding Wolff. His cross through the area found Davies by the far post, and he finished for his league-leading sixth goal of the season.
The victory snapped a two-game losing streak for United (3-4-1), which had conceded four goals in each of those losses.
"I thought we had a response," United coach Ben Olsen said. "We were pretty charged up and knew what was at stake. It wasn't dire that he had these three points, but it was pretty important for where we're at and where we were at mentally this week. I'm glad the guys got rewarded for a pretty good effort overall."
Olsen made a few changes to his starting lineup, playing rookie Perry Kitchen at right back, rookie Ethan White at centerback and starting Najar, who had been relegated to the bench since March 26.
The Sounders (3-3-3), meanwhile, had their six-game unbeaten streak snapped and fielded the same lineup that started in Saturday's 3-0 win over Toronto FC. They pulled a goal back after Fredy Montero was tripped up in the box by Dejan Jakovic in the 70th minute. Brad Evans scored on the ensuing penalty kick to tally from the spot for the second straight game and slice the deficit in half.
"I think we started out a little bit too flat, and we knew D.C. was a team with their back against the wall," Evans said. "For us, we didn’t play as well as we did last week, especially as far as moving the ball and keeping the ball in possession in our attacking half of the field."
D.C. goalkeeper Bill Hamid came up big on two occasions in the second half to preserve the lead and the three points.
He robbed Alvaro Fernandez of a point-blank header with a tremendous reaction save to parry the ball over the bar just minutes after Evans' penalty. Moments after that, Montero tried to find the upper right-hand corner from the edge of the box, but Hamid got a fingertip to the shot with a full-extension dive.
"(Coaches) have been harping on me to stay big," said Hamid, who tweaked his lower back on a punch late in the first half but is fully expected to start on Saturday against FC Dallas. "We've worked on it in training the past couple days. I definitely felt like I needed to step up."
The loss was the first-ever for Seattle at RFK Stadium in four matches (all competitions). The loss was also the first at RFK for Keller, who was a combined 8-0-2 for the Sounders and U.S. national team at the venue entering the night.
