D.C. United coach Bruce Arena is accustomed to winning. He was definitely not a happy man Sunday after United was beaten 2-0 in the MLS Cup by the Chicago Fire, coached by his former assistant, Bob Bradley.
The United coach, who guided his team to the title in the MLS' first two years, groused about the officiating and the fact his team had to play three games in eight days and had just three days off between its final playoff game and the title match."I'm very disappointed with a couple of controversial calls in the game," Arena said. "It's hard for me to believe we are not champions. The breaks went their way. A couple breaks go our way and maybe we're champions again.
"It seemed like we weren't given a chance in some way to defend our championship, with the number of cards dealt against us."
Arena, whose two MLS championships and five NCAA titles at Virginia have made him the frontrunner to become the next U.S. national team coach, did try to sprinkle compliments among his complaints about the loss to the expansion Fire.
"I applaud the Fire's effort; they deserve to be champions," he said. "There were controversial calls, but I don't want to take anything away from Chicago's game."
Bradley, Arena's close friend and an assistant under him first at Virginia, then with D.C., agreed the chips fell Chicago's way in the MLS Cup.
"Bruce is right on those issues. The Fire ended up getting breaks and that helped determine the game,' Bradley said.
Arena contended the Fire's Ante Razov should have been called offsides on Chicago's second goal. Referee Kevin Terry, however, held that Razov did not interfere on the play, thus no call was necessary.
Arena also complained about Lubos Kubik's tackle on D.C. midfielder Marco Etcheverry in the Chicago penalty box four minutes into the game, saying United should have been awarded a penalty kick. There was no call on the play.
Jerzy Podbrozny and Diego Gutierrez scored goals 16 minutes apart in the first half and goalkeeper Zach Thornton and the Fire defense did the rest before a crowd of 51,350 at the Rose Bowl on a warm, sunny day.
The victory was Bradley's first significant win over his former boss - his Princeton team lost to Arena's Cavaliers in the 1993 NCAA semifinals and the Fire were beaten 3-1 and 4-1 by D.C. this season.
Thornton made eight saves as the Fire thwarted United's high-powered offense, including league MVP Etcheverry and strikers Jaime Moreno and Roy Lassiter. D.C. outshot the Fire 22-10 and held an 8-4 edge in shots on goal, including 6-0 in the second half.
Chicago midfielder and captain Peter Nowak, a native of Poland and one of a quartet of Chicago's "Eastern Bloc" players, was voted MVP of the championship game, an honor that went to United's Moreno last year and Etcheverry in 1996.
"This is a very special day for me because I've never won a championship," said Nowak, who assisted on both goals.
The first half featured continuing attacks by both sides, with D.C. taking three shots in the opening four minutes, and Chicago also came forward on the attack.
Podbrozny, another Polish player, finished what was a textbook bit of passing to give Chicago the lead in the 29th minute.
Gutierrez began it just outside the D.C. box, passing to Kubik, from the Czech Republic. Kubik passed the ball to Nowak, who fed Razov as the United defenders tried an offsides trap. Razov rolled a perfectly paced pass beyond the defensive line and Nowak sprinted to the ball and dribbled toward the left post, with goalie Tom Presthus forced to come out on him.
Nowak rolled the ball slowly across the goal mouth and the charging Podbrozny tapped it into the open net to complete a scoring sequence in which half the Fire's field players touched the ball.
Gutierrez, a Colombian who missed all of last season with Kansas City because of torn ligaments in his left knee, gave Chicago a pad by being in the right place at the right time in the closing seconds of the first half. Nowak got off a shot toward the center of the goal that Presthus could have stopped, but the ball deflected off Gutierrez and veered into the left rear corner of the net.
With a two-goal lead in the second half, Chicago returned to the defensive stance that was its trademark during the regular season and a two-game sweep of Los Angeles in the conference playoffs.