When Darren Huckerby was acquired in the middle of last season, the San Jose Earthquakes soon embarked on a nine-game unbeaten streak that thrust them into the thick of the MLS playoff race. And while the Englishman settled in quickly, there were a few things that he didn't experience upon donning the Earthquakes' black-and-blue.
Huckerby not only failed to find the net on the road, but he also has yet to enjoy an away win. Those are trends both the player and the team will be looking to reverse on Sunday afternoon when the Quakes travel to Kansas City to face the winless Wizards at CommunityAmerica Ballpark.
Granted, for San Jose, road victories were as rare as good economic news in 2008, as the Quakes won away from home just twice all season. That was primarily due to the team scoring a total of just 10 road goals. But fresh off their 3-2 win over Houston, the sense is that the time is now to build on their newfound attacking prowess and achieve a breakthrough away from home.
"In this league, any result away from home is good," said Huckerby. "But we've got players who can cause teams a lot of problems. If we continue to create chances like we have the last two games, I think we'll be OK."
The Quakes will be taking on a Kansas City side for which little has gone right in the season's opening weeks, especially on the defensive end, where the Wizards have already conceded five goals. But Huckerby is taking little comfort from Kansas City's 0-2-0 start.
"You could have said the same thing about us before last week," said Huckerby in reference to the Wizards struggles. "We'll take [Kansas City] at face value and go there expecting them to be playing well and doing OK. If you had just seen the result of our first game, you would have thought we didn't play very well, but we should have scored five or six goals."
While much of the San Jose offense will go through wide players Huckerby and Arturo Alvarez, an interesting matchup will feature the Quakes' own version of the Bash Brothers -- forwards Ryan Johnson and Cam Weaver -- going up against Kansas City's perennial All-Star defender Jimmy Conrad.
Last week against Houston, both Johnson and Weaver scored their first goals of the season, while throwing their considerable bulk around. San Jose manager Frank Yallop is hoping that the duo will have a similar impact on Sunday.
"Our two big boys up front have done a good job of softening up teams for other guys," said Yallop. "Darren, Arturo, and Bobby [Convey] are getting a little more used to it, coming from underneath and running off people, because [Weaver and Johnson] are banging into guys and things are popping down."
Defensively, the Quakes could stand to improve on a few things, as a Houston team missing both starting forwards caused plenty of problems for San Jose, especially out wide.
Kansas City certainly has enough weapons to test the Quakes. Midfielder Davy Arnaud sat out last week's loss to Colorado with a neck strain but said earlier this week he's more optimistic about suiting up against San Jose. Former Argentinean international Claudio Lopez, while failing to find the net, hasn't lacked for opportunities, and it seems to be only a matter of time before a player of his pedigree regains his scoring touch. Midfield players like Jack Jewsbury and Herculez Gomez possess plenty of grit while also being threats going forward.
For Yallop, that means summoning an effort similar to last week's encounter.
"It's so early in the season, I don't look at their record," said Yallop of Kansas City. "They're still a good side. They're going to be very determined to get a result at home, so we have to be ready on that front."
If they can, then it will be a new experience for their resident Englishman.
Jeff Carlisle is a contributor to MLSnet.com.
