Houston, TX (Sports Network) - D.C. United helped to open BBVA Compass Stadium
back in May, and the club will return to Texas to take on the Houston Dynamo
for the third and final time in the regular season on Sunday.
Houston claimed a 1-0 win in its inaugural match at BBVA, and the Dynamo has
yet to taste defeat at its new ground, something United would love to change.
With five wins in its last six games, United is one of the hottest teams in
the league at the moment, and Ben Olsen's side will have the benefit of an
extra week of rest ahead of the match.
In United's last visit to Houston, the club struggled to cope with the heat in
Texas and suffered a slew of in-game injuries.
But Olsen said he won't be using the warm temperatures as an excuse this time
around.
"We can't use the heat as an excuse," Olsen said this week. "The summer has
been brutal here so the guys are ready for that. It will be a level playing
field as far as heat, it shouldn't be an issue."
One player who should be used to the heat is former Dynamo player Dwayne De
Rosario, who spent much of his career with the club before bouncing around the
past few seasons.
De Rosario leads United with 10 assists, and Chris Pontius, who has benefited
from many quality passes from his teammate, is impressed with how well De
Rosario has fit in.
"He obviously adapts," Pontius said of De Rosario. "He has done it with a
number of different teams, too. To be consistently that good, it shows a lot."
De Rosario's former team hasn't been consistently good this season, but coach
Dominic Kinnear's bunch has managed to capture five points from its last three
games, with the club posting back-to-back clean sheets in its two most recent
outings.
"We know we're not exactly lighting the scoreboard up, but we were unbeaten
last week and that's a positive," Kinnear told MLSsoccer.com, "but there's
always room for improvement and maintaining consistency is something we're
striving for.
"We gave up seven goals in two games and made an adjustment and now the attack
has suffered a bit. "It's a balancing act. To give yourself a chance to win
games, you have to defend well and score goals, and we're trying to do both."
The Dynamo will be very busy over the course of the upcoming week with three
matches to play.
But all three will come at home, where Houston has tallied 10 goals in seven
games.
"We've got three at home where we're undefeated and we need to start picking
up ground and getting some points," midfielder Brad Davis said. "We've gone
two games giving up no goals which is a positive. I'd like to see the
floodgates open up for sure, everybody would, but we can't get away from what
we're doing."
The Sports Network