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Off the Crossbar, Episode Five: Celebrating a win, preparing for a battle, and internationals

We won big on Saturday against Toronto FC, so we're in a celebratory mood with this week's podcast. We talk that 3-0 over Toronto FC, the upcoming rematch against Kansas City, and our international superstars who faced Mexico last night.

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Toronto FC

We touch on the bright points of our 3-0 win over Toronto FC, focusing specifically on why we performed as well as we did. We talk about negating Michael Bradey's impact, the best players in our win, and why Saborio had one of his best games in recent memory.

We move on to talk about everyone's favorite topic: refereeing. We discuss the Disciplinary Committee - everyone's second favorite topic, no doubt - with particular focus on Steven Caldwell's very poor suspension-earning tackle on Ned Grabavoy. We also talk about Ryan Nelsen's complaints about the Disco, which, when compared with his comments a week before calling for the committee to take action on Alvaro Saborio.

Matt also takes a moment to celebrate his somewhat-correct prediction, but without a Ryan Nelsen own-goal, what's the point?

Kansas City

When you listen between our tears and moaning about the MLS Cup final in Kansas City, we talk about what next Saturday's match brings. Do we have what it takes to match up against Sporting Kansas City? We hope so, and we're pretty sure it'll be a strong lineup we'll see for the good folks (that's Real Salt Lake, if you weren't certain.) We wonder about motivation (not whether we'll have any or not, because there's no question there) and talk about what it will take for a win. I think the first step will probably be scoring goals.

Internationals!

Hey, there was an international match last night. The United States and Mexico drew 2-2, and we want to know why. We assess the performances of Tony Beltran (good), Kyle Beckerman (even gooder) and Nick Rimando (as good as ever) and wonder what it would take for Chris Schuler to make the World Cup squad. Chances, we all agree, don't look good for that one.

Listener questions

We answer your questions. Did we miss any? Have more for us? Ask us here or on Twitter.