When the final match of the 2007 Major League Soccer season came to an end last November at RFK Stadium in Washington D.C., the Houston Dynamo were champions again.
And for the third consecutive year, the New England Revolution would go home as the runner-up.
Saturday night in Foxborough, the Revolution will get a chance to start to erase some of those painful memories -- the season opener for both teams features a rematch of the last two MLS Cup Finals. Houston won in 2006 on penalty kicks and repeated the following year by scoring two goals in the second half to erase a 1-0 deficit.
Dynamo midfielder Richard Mulrooney joined the team via trade last season and says starting the season against their rivals from the East is a great way to kick off the year.
The timing of the game, he said, is no coincidence.
"I think they league did that for TV reasons, and we knew we were going to have to play them at some point," Mulrooney said. "But, they remember what happened last year, and the year before."
The Dynamo and Revs have each lost a few key players, but it won't make the significance of the game any less.
Notably missing from Houston are Nate Jaqua and Joseph Ngwenya, who each signed contracts to play overseas in Europe; the pair combined for 13 of Houston's 43 goals a season ago.
Former Revolution forward Pat Noonan and his 42 career MLS goals is also gone after signing to play for a team in Norway. He will be missed, but it won't make this rivalry any less interesting.
"One team is going to start 1-0 and the other one is going to start off with a loss or we could tie," said Mulrooney. "Either way, it is a good place to start the season off."
Dynamo head coach Dominic Kinnear said favorable training weather has given his team the chance to build up some much-needed endurance for the early test against the Revolution.
In the week leading up to the opener however, Kinnear didn't have a full squad to prepare, with a few bumps and bruises after the Dynamo's victory against Guatemala's CSD Municipal in the CONCACAF Champions' Cup and three call-ups to national teams (Ricardo Clark, Brian Ching, Dwayne DeRosario). Clark will be suspended for the first two games of the 2008 MLS season, finishing out the ban levied last September.
"We had three guys gone this week playing for their country, so that makes it kind of hard when you are preparing for what you want to do in the opener," Kinnear said. "But guys are training hard and they are in good spirits. So with that I think we are in pretty good shape to field a pretty good squad for Saturday."
Houston will be opening the year against a New England team has never lost in the regular season to the Dynamo. In four games, there have been three ties, with two of those coming in Foxborough.
Also, the Revs have never lost their first rematch with the team that beat them in the finals from the year before.
New England has finished second in four of the last six seasons overall, but they did record the club's first major honor a year ago by winning the 2007 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup.
Those are all just notes that can be fun to throw around, but Mulrooney says none of that has any bearing on the game that will be played Saturday night.
"At the end of the year, we know they are going to be in the thick of the race and playing them early will give us a chance to see where we are and how we stack up early in the season," Mulrooney said.
Andrew J. Ferraro is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
