While the Kansas City Wizards came from behind to salvage a 1-1 draw with the visiting Columbus Crew on Wednesday night, their frustration was palpable.
"We should have gotten three points tonight," said forward Davy Arnaud.
"All too often, whether it was Chivas out there or New England in New England, we play half a game," Wizards head coach Bob Gansler lamented.
Said defender Jose Burciaga Jr.: "We're letting points slip away."
Coming off gaining a point for the first time ever in Chicago on June 18 and a 3-0 home win against Chivas USA last Saturday, the Wizards were looking to rise closer to the elite in MLS with a victory against the last-place Crew.
But a mustering of only two shots on goal in the first half continued a season-long refrain that then manifested another.
"There is complacency. Is it overconfidence, [or] is it stupidity?" asked Gansler.
"We don't come out of the chute well enough. We know it; [the players] remind each other as well as I remind them. We can find a lot of other things to be upset about out there, but we've got to look at ourselves first. We just let ourselves down because this is home, this is our turf. We've got to come out and be in charge. That means we get it, we keep it -- that means we work out possibilities, we get our shots."
The Wizards had control of the match through most of the opening 20 minutes, but they only created one strong opportunity, and it fell to Davy Arnaud in the 17th minute as he took a ball played back from Chris Klein's position deep in the right corner of the Crew penalty area and struck it over the bar.
The only save required from Bill Gaudette, the Crew's third-string goalkeeper, was in the 24th minute on a shot from rookie Scott Sealy that was hit right at him.
"We were not in charge in the first half. And that's not acceptable. We've got to get better. It's a little bit of a broken record," said Gansler. "Maybe we've got to break something else."
The Wizards stagnation bit them in the 69th minute as Mario Rodriguez pounced on the rebound of a Simon Elliott shot to put the Crew ahead and force the home side to battle back.
And through Preki, the Wizards did in fine fashion. Yet the abundance of opportunities and the equalizer created served only to mask the problem.
"Then we come back and we play well and there's a positive. We seem to hang on to that, but we forget the egg we laid in the first half," said a rueful Gansler.
Nine shots were taking by the awakened Wizards in the second stanza, and even though only two were on goal, the ball movement and chances created were somewhat redeeming.
"When you work hard like that as a team and probably should be in the lead and then you concede a goal, it's tough," Arnaud said. "But we showed good character and didn't let it get us down. The pressure finally paid off."
Burciaga Jr.'s 76th-minute equalizer off a set piece delivered by a foul on a penetrating Preki, evened the match and salvaged a point for Kansas City. A point, when combined with Chicago's 4-3 victory against D.C. United on Wednesday night, that means the Wizards fall two more points back of the second-place Fire.
"We let them stay in the game. If you let a team like that stay in the game, they get an unlucky bounce, or whatever you want to call it, type of goal and the next thing you know, you get a draw when you should have gotten a win," Wizards 'keeper Bo Oshoniyi said. "[Tying] gets old after awhile, especially in games at home."
Indeed the Wizards habit of tying matches, seven in 15 games this season, is another broken record.
If the Wizards want to fulfill what they surely believe is there destiny of being a major player in the Eastern Conference and all of MLS, they will have to consistently play well out of the gate and put teams away to gain more victories and the valuable three points that come along.
Maybe then, thoughts like Oshoniyi's won't be heard so often.
"We didn't have the effort tonight. We should have gotten something out of it earlier. It was unfortunate to come out of here with a draw," he said.
Robert Rusert is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
