Chivas USA postscript: the point earned was better than the performance

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Two games in a row without a loss has to be counted as a positive, even if Chivas USA did not look exactly scintillating in its 0-0 tie with the Columbus Crew over the weekend.

Truth be told, the Crew looked pretty pedestrian itself and, as Chivas goalkeeper Dan Kennedy pointed out afterward, the visitors came in looking for a tie and got one.

“Columbus just tried to kill the game,” Kennedy said. “They wanted to make it slow and they wanted us to play long balls into their backs and then they killed the game off that way.

“We did our best to move the ball with speed, and maybe we could have done a little better with that, but at the end of the day we got a shutout and at least we took a point out of that.”

Chivas is slowly coming together as a team and, once injured players such as Simon Elliott and Paulo Nagamura return and the players become more familiar with each other, the results should improve. That would be especially true if the team adds the goal-hungry forward it is said to be seeking.

The name being mentioned at the moment is that of 18-year-old English forward Jason Banton, but Chivas Coach Robin Fraser has been guarded about whether the teenager, who has spent time with Blackburn Rovers and Liverpool, is really in his thinking.

Banton scored a goal on Sunday for the Chivas reserve team in a scrimmage in Carson.

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--Grahame L. Jones