A fire broke out on the prairie outside of Dick's Sporting Goods Park during Friday night's postgame fireworks display. It was quickly doused, extinguished about the time the fireworks ran out, which is more than could be said for the relentless Colorado Rapids, who caught fire early in Friday's match and were never contained.
On an ever-evolving Colorado Rapids team, two things have stayed the same: the Rapids play at home on the USA's birthday, and the Rapids win those games, year after year.
Friday night's 4-0 blanking of the New York Red Bulls was no exception, improving the Rapids record to 11-1-1 on the Fourth of July, with every one of those matches played at home. They have a nine-match unbeaten streak on Independence Day, having suffered their only loss in 1999 against Columbus.
"I'm trying to talk to [Rapids general manager] Charlie Wright to make every game become a Fourth of July," head coach Fernando Clavijo said between the fireworks on the field and the fireworks after the game. "Fifteen Fourth of July games this season at home.
"The players react well to crowds," he added, on a more serious note. "They react well to this kind of atmosphere. They like to play in that kind of situation and that kind of pressure. Hopefully we can transfer this kind of effort and the result into the coming games."
You might think that such a near-perfect success record on July 4 would alleviate some of the pressure for the Rapids, but the players definitely had a sense of heightened expectations Friday night, in part because of the record-breaking crowd at Dick's Sporting Goods Park, and in part because of the urgency of not having won in their last four matches.
"We kind of felt pressure today," team captain Pablo Mastroeni said. "We haven't had a win in a while. We want to come out strong and be aggressive. If a play didn't work out, we wanted to make sure we pressured them quickly. Get on top of them and take the wind out of their sails, and I think we did a good job of that."
By the end of the first half, the Rapids were up 2-0, en route to doubling that score in the second half and matching their season high of four goals, scored against L.A., also in front of a capacity crowd at home on Opening Day.
"Tonight reminds me of the first game of the year," Clavijo said. "I thought we'd played well throughout the last four or five games. We just couldn't score. The players are playing hard. Every game except maybe San Jose at home we had a chance to win, on the road or at home. Today we proved it. We had a good attitude from the beginning. It was understood that playing good and playing hard was not good enough any more. We have to get results. We have a very good team, but you cannot win without scoring goals."
The win was a total team effort, with four different players - Tom McManus, Mehdi Ballouchy, Colin Clark and Omar Cummings - each scoring goals and six different players each earning an assist.
"Everybody wanted to win," said goalkeeper Bouna Coundoul, who recorded his fifth shutout of the season. "If we play like this every single game, home or on the road, it'll be tough for us not to get a 'W.' Today it was a whole team effort from the goalie, the forwards, the guys on the bench, the fans, everybody pitched in. It was like a whole Colorado Rapids unity team win."
And while Clavijo works on making every day the Fourth of July, Coundoul has a companion plan to replicate the Rapids' home atmosphere when the team hits the road.
"We need to bring the fans with us when we travel," Coundoul said, emphatically pointing out the role the Fourth of July crowd played in pushing the team to victory. "The fans are picking up the rhythm. Everything that soccer really needs, the Colorado Rapids fans are picking it up. They know when to cheer, when to boo, and that counts a lot. Especially when the team is doing well and you stand up and see, 'hey, we got the crowd behind us, so we can do a lot better than this.'"
Ultimately, while both the Clavijo and Coundoul proposals have their merits, the Rapids will need to consistently replicate the tight, crisp play they showcased Friday night throughout the remainder of the season if they want to climb back to .500 and make the run at the playoffs they believe they can achieve.
"Sadly we're capable of [playing like this every night]," said Clark, who had an assist on the first goal and scored the third, unassisted. "Sometimes we don't show it. It was great tonight. The atmosphere was great. The Fourth of July Festival and everything was phenomenal. The fans were great and we did what we're capable of doing. If we consistently play better, we're not going to score four goals every game, but I have a feeling we're going to come away with much better results than we've been coming away with."
Perhaps the most promising element in Friday's win was the fact the players were not letting it go to their heads. They have struggled too much this season to let a single win, no matter how decisive, make them overconfident. If they can beat San Jose on the road next week, it would mark the first time all season the club has put two successive wins together.
"Today was a good look in the mirror," Mastroeni said. "For the first time it felt like we were combining, putting another team on their heels in the first half. We kind of set the tone that way. If the passing is sharper, if the passing is quicker, if the guy that receives the ball has one more second because you made a quicker decision yourself, we're going to be so much better off. Today we did that. We found passes early. People knew where they were going before they got it. Then the next guy on the ball can make a better decision. And it just trickled down all the way down the field. ... And the result of that is a good game for us."
The festive crowd might have sparked the club Friday night, but the Rapids know it is up to them to meet the challenge and keep the fire burning like every day is the Fourth of July.
Owen Perkins is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
