WASHINGTON, D.C. -- In Saturday night's opening game of the SuperLiga tournament between DC United and Chivas de Guadalajara, it almost seemed as though the goalposts at RFK Stadium were playing favorites.  United hit two posts but failed to score in crucial junctures, and Guadalajara banked a goal in off the crossbar on a questionable direct kick as the Mexican Primera Division squad beat DC, 2-1, in front of a loud and evenly split crowd of 22,453.

 

CD Guadalajara opened the scoring in the 24th minute as Chivas forward Omar Riveron was the beneficiary of a defensive breakdown by DC United.

D.C. midfielder Clyde Simms made an ill-advised slide tackle when going for a loose ball against Ramon Morales in United's defensive half, and as Morales came away cleanly with the ball and passed to Riveron, United defender Brian Namoff slipped to the turf and left Riveron all alone to go in on goalie Zach Wells. Wells tried to challenge the ball carrier, but Riveron ran right around Wells' left side and kicked the ball into the yawning net to give Chivas a 1-0 lead.

Neither team scored again until the 72nd minute, when Chivas midfielder Gonzalo Pineda extended the Guadalajara lead to 2-0 when he converted a direct kick after a borderline call.

With the ball about 15 feet above United's penalty area, Simms and a Chivas player converged on it at the same time, with Simms winning the race to the ball and making a good clear while the Chivas player bounced off of him and fell to the ground. But the referee deemed it a foul on Simms and Pineda floated the resulting direct kick perfectly over the defensive wall and the goalie, off the crossbar and into the goal.

"He hit a pretty good ball over the wall, and it dipped just under the crossbar. I got a fingertip to it but it came from such a high point," Wells said of the decisive goal. "It was pretty close to the crossbar and it dipped just below at the last second."

"I was a bit uncertain about the foul call, to be honest," he added. "That's the way soccer goes sometimes."

With the momentum clearly in the Mexican side's favor with 15 minutes remaining, a frantic two minutes almost brought DC even.

Luciano Emilio cut the lead in the 76th minute when he emerged from a pack of players with the ball and a clean look at the net in the Chivas penalty area. Emilio quickly pushed a low shot underneath Chivas goalie Luis Michel to make it 2-1. Namoff assisted on the goal.

In the 78th minute Emilio got free again and was taken down from behind in the penalty area, resulting in a penalty kick for United. Jaime Moreno, the MLS all-time leading penalty kick scorer, aimed for the low corner to Michel's left, but the Chivas keeper made a diving stop to preserve the one-goal lead.

"He make a great save and give credit to him," Moreno said after the game. "I picked my spot ... I didn't change it, so he did well in waiting for me."

It may not be the blocked penalty kick that United looks back on as the most crucial missed opportunity of the game, though, as they also had two brilliant scoring opportunities that were thwarted by the goalposts.  In the eighth minute of the game, Emilio made a stutter-step move to gain an advantage on a Chivas defender before unloading a powerful shot that clanked off the left goalpost.

About 10 minutes into the second half, DC midfielder Devon McTavish made some nifty moves to get free with the ball in deep behind the Chivas defense and had almost the entire net to shoot at. But McTavish's shot for a seemingly easy goal struck squarely on the right post and bounced into Chivas possession.

"Against good teams you're going to create opportunities and we have to finish them. It's unfortunate that we were a little unlucky with the posts," United Head Coach Tom Soehn said in his post game press conference. "The loss is disappointing but we can't hang our heads. We've got to turn around now and get a couple results to make sure we advance."

Chivas wasn't without missed opportunities of their own, though, as Wells came up big for United on several occasions.  In the 11th minute, Guadalajara forward Sergio Santana got behind the United defense as a pass came to him, but Wells made an aggressive play, sliding out to kick the ball away from harm.

Shortly after DC's second goalpost strike, Santana got another great chance for Chivas streaking down the right side, but Wells came a few steps out of his net and was able to block the shot with his right hand without having to move to either side.

Late substitution Marco de la Mora was inches from extending the Chivas lead back to two in the waning minutes as he got a pass behind the United defense, but Wells made a brilliant save to deflect the in-tight shot wide to the right of the goal.

With the action heating up in the 59th minute and the teams trading opportunities, the lights went out in RFK Stadium, and there was a 19-minute delay.

"We started to take it to them and unfortunately when the lights went out, I think they recuperated a little bit," Soehn said.

United will need to rebound quickly if it hopes to advance out of the SuperLiga group stage. DC resumes SuperLiga play at RFK Stadium on Tuesday night when they face Atlante, another Mexican team. They then take on Houston Dynamo at RFK next Saturday to conclude group play.