Before this season, there were several stadiums where FC Dallas had either never won at or had not emerged victorious at in some time. The Hoops have exorcised virtually all of those road demons this year, but one remains: Robertson Stadium, home to Houston Dynamo.
In each of four trips to the Orange's home field, they have left the Bayou City with a losing result. But with the deciding second leg of their Western Conference Semifinal Series set for Robertson on Friday, FCD looks to end their run of bad results in Houston and emerge with their first playoff series victory since 1999.
It started back on April 12, when the Hoops beat the LA Galaxy 2-1 at The Home Depot Center, their first-ever win against them at the HDC. A month later, they beat Kansas City by the same score for their first win at Arrowhead Stadium since 1999. But the real landmark win came on Oct. 6 in a 3-1 win against Columbus, FCD's first-ever win at Crew Stadium.
FCD head coach Steve Morrow sees no reason why the trend can't continue.
"We're 100 percent confident that we're going to go there and win the game," Morrow said. "We're not going there to get a tie. We're going there to win the game and to attack. We need to possess the ball better than we did the other night and play with as much intensity and fully intend to go there and win like we've done at other places this season."
With confidence riding high in Frisco after the Hoops' 1-0 win against Dynamo on Saturday at Pizza Hut Park to kick off their series in solid fashion, Morrow's players also believe a win at Robertson isn't out of the realm of possibility.
"I think we've proven to ourselves this season in places where we haven't been able to win before," said right back Bobby Rhine. "We know that none of that really matters. All that matters is playing on Friday.
"We've worked on not thinking about the past over the last few weeks and moving forward," he said. "I think that's the thing that has helped us really fight through a tough patch. We know that there's nothing you can do about previous games, you have to focus on the one in front of you."
Forward Abe Thompson added: "That would be phenomenal to beat Houston at their place and to advance to the next round. We have the advantage going into the game and are looking to fight just as hard as we did this past weekend and set the tone from the beginning."
Morrow chalks up his side's big road wins this year to one thing -- a great mentality, something the Hoops showed in last Saturday's victory.
"We've talked about our mentality on the road and how we approach games," Morrow said. "I think we've approached games with the right mentality and the right fight. You have to go in tighter on the road, play with a bit more intensity and be more careful with the ball. I think we've had a good road mentality for the most part this year but that has been a big difference."
Thompson remembers himself and his teammates feeding off the challenge of having never won at those venues before and sees that continuing.
"We just went in focused," he said. "We're reminded going in that we've never won there before. That's a challenge for us and we look forward to overcoming those challenges. This weekend will be no different."
Playing on the road means that scoring first becomes even more important, especially considering that all three 1-0 results in the opening leg came after the home side drew first blood and then held on for the win.
"Certainly that (scoring first) would be nice to do down there," Rhine said. "I think it's important to score first because rarely do teams come back from being a goal down. Fortunately we have a few games where we can say that we've done that and that's something we can hang our hat on but playoffs are a different competition."
Steve Hunt is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
