It's Official: Galaxy Off to a Rapid Start

By GRAHAME L. JONES

March 19, 2000 12 AM PT

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

In early balloting--very early considering Saturday was the first day of Major League Soccer’s fifth season--Ricardo Valenzuela holds the lead in the race for referee of the year.

After all, how many other officials can see two nonexistent penalties in the span of 13 minutes and blow an offside call too?

Valenzuela’s keen eyesight was better than anyone else’s on a cool evening at the Rose Bowl, where a crowd of 24,831 watched the Galaxy defeat the Colorado Rapids, 2-1.

Even aside from Valenzuela’s peculiar refereeing exhibition, it was a strange contest. One team was without a coach and the other without any players.

In cases such as this, the safe bet is always to go with the team minus its mentor.

The Galaxy’s Sigi Schmid watched the game from high in the press box, banished from the sideline for one game by the league for protesting a little too loudly and a little too publicly about feeble officiating at last season’s MLS championship game.

Apparently, not much about the officiating has changed.

The Galaxy took the lead in the 60th minute when Cobi Jones sent a blistering shot into the upper right corner of the net off a pass from Mauricio Cienfuegos.

Two minutes later, Valenzuela made his first bizarre decision.

He called a penalty kick against Galaxy goalkeeper Kevin Hartman for upending Paul Bravo, failing to note that the Colorado forward was offside to begin with and that Hartman had played the ball, not the man.

Furious protests by the Galaxy players fell on deaf ears and Bravo scored from the 12-yard spot to tie the score, 1-1.

Thirteen minutes later came the “make-up” call. This time Valenzuela whistled a disbelieving Marcelo Balboa after the Rapid defender had cleanly stripped Cienfuegos, only for the Salvadoran midfielder to fall to the turf.

With Balboa still finger-pointing at Valenzuela, Greg Vanney made no mistake with the penalty kick and the Galaxy held on for the victory.

Assistant coach Ralph Perez, filling in for Schmid, deftly dodged the inevitable questions about the officiating, especially on Bravo’s goal, which broke Colorado’s league-record scoreless streak of 743 minutes.

“I want to be on the bench with Sigi for the next game,” he joked. “Watching the replay afterwards kind of confirmed that maybe there was a decision there that could have gone the other way.

“PKs [penalty kicks] are always a difficult call in soccer.”

And the nonexistent foul against Cienfuegos?

“One of the things that was really hard for us last year was that there were a lot of calls on PKs that [referees] kind of missed a little bit,” he said. “Maybe tonight one of those that was missed last year we got tonight.”

Because his team has been decimated by preseason injuries, Colorado Coach Glen Myernick fielded a lineup that featured only half his regular starters. Unhappy as he was with the result and the officiating, Myernick praised his team.

“We have a very depleted squad at the moment but I believe in every one of our players or they wouldn’t be on our roster,” he said. “I felt we came in here and battled very well. We knew we were going to give up a lot of possession, we had a lot of inexperienced players on the field. We had a few good chances, created a penalty kick for ourselves and it’s unfortunate that we lost the game but I’m proud of my team.”

The Galaxy could have taken the lead as early as the eighth minute, when Jones crossed the ball in from the right flank and Clint Mathis, twisting in the air, powered a header off the crossbar.

Seven minutes later, the woodwork again denied the Galaxy. This time it was Cienfuegos’ turn to be frustrated. He cut past a defender and hit a shot that bounced off the foot of the right post.

Colorado’s Adin Brown, the U.S. Olympic team goalkeeper, had an excellent MLS debut.

“He was outstanding,” said Myernick. “Outstanding. He kept us in the game.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

HOME OPENERS

2000

vs. COLORADO

Galaxy wins, 2-1

Attendance: 24,831

1999

vs. COLORADO

Galaxy wins, 2-1*

Attendance: 17,343