FC Dallas

Hello and welcome to the Build Up Your FC Dallas game preview show and today we are previewing FC Dallas back at home at Toyota Stadium for the second time in a couple weeks against the Portland Timbers.

Hello everybody, I'm your host Sam Hale.

We'll be joined in just a moment today by Steve Davis and Garrett Meltzer, our Build Up crew for the afternoon.

Let's go ahead and set the stage for this one.

FC Dallas, fourth in the Western Conference on 40 points.

They're just trailing LAFC, not on wins, but on goal differentials.

We've made it to second tiebreakers there.

It was a 2-1 win at Minnesota with Santi Moreno scoring the winner with about 10 minutes to go in that one.

I know, yes, we need to close these games out, but we've only dropped eight points across this entire stretch.

That was against four teams, D.C. United, Sporting, Kansas City, FC Dallas, and now Portland.

But with those, it's been a very small time period that we have not gotten those points.

And also, we've gained four of six points that we could have gotten when we were from behind.

Yeah, I kind of went the same direction where I was just like, wow, this guy scores lots of goals and he's really good.

And that's Peter Moussa from FC Dallas, who we're going to see in about a month.

So yeah, that's enough said.

I think it's 18 goals, four assists in the league this year.

Then I started at Solar.

And then I moved into FC Dallas Academy, which is where my brother was.

I'm glad he was able to open that pathway up for me.

And it wasn't easy for my parents because we lived in Keller.

I mean, obviously, like I said, in college, in this team it was a good team that had come from losing in the usl cup final to round monarchs the year before and then in 2018 winning the whole thing so it was it was a it's a club that has um history and winning so it's not like okay the 16 year old is just going to walk in here and and like start and be like the star of the show and i think that was also a good lesson for me like It's not just this is this is, I guess, real life soccer.

This is like a grown man's game, you know.

And so I think that was also a good lesson for me to get, you know, adapted to the situation, but also like a reality check that like, OK, not not everything is like FC Dallas Academy where you're going to play every weekend.

Like this is this is what it's really like.

And it was after the games, I've gotten to the habit now.

And I always ask him, do you want to talk? What do you want to do? Do you want to listen to music? If it's just him and I, do you want to talk about FC Dallas? Do you want to talk? What do you want to do? And he'll pick.

But he knows exactly what's on my mind by what I tell him after each game.

If I tell him I love him, I will always say that he knows that no matter how well he does on the pitch, I will always say I love him because I truly love my children.

He goes by Nipper.

His name is Neil Thornburg.

He still runs a little FC Dallas now.

Don't play in the true.

I don't know if you stuck around, but he was going sort of finger in the face of some St. Louis defenders.

It would have been disappointing if he got himself in trouble for the next game against Dallas.

That's where I thought maybe somebody was going to end up throwing a punch.

It just felt like it was just boiling over the edge, but maybe both of them were just a little bit all bark and no bite.

Next couple of games...

After kickoff, I just want the Timbers to hold possession for like 90 seconds.

I know that's probably easier said than done if you're getting pressed, but especially against Dallas, who is the second highest scoring team at the Western Conference, I did not have on my bingo card that Dallas would be two and Portland would be three, more than 75% into the season.

But...

Yeah, I think with that decision, it had a lot to behind the scenes.

But ultimately, I feel that Dallas has so much talent, like from youth programs, from Solar to FC Dallas, to all those great teams.

And those players go to close colleges nearby, like Texas TCU, or even like obviously other colleges.

But I would say there's so much talent in Dallas that I feel like I wanted to grow the game in Dallas.