HOUSTON -- The Houston Dynamo have to be thinking that fate was on their side after pulling out a last-minute win against San Francisco FC Tuesday night in CONCACAF Champions League Group B play.
Sure, they might have been the favored team in the 2-1 win at Robertson Stadium. But until Dwayne De Rosario beat Carlos Valdes in the 88th minute, it looked like just another draw for the Orange.
Emotions shot from one end of the spectrum to the other in a matter of minutes, as Chris Wondolowski's bid for a second goal deflected off the post followed by De Rosario's 25-yard unassisted shot that beat a screened Valdes for the final margin.
Fate, you ask?
Had De Rosario not received a yellow card in the Canadian national team's last match against Mexico -- when leaves him suspended for the team's match against Honduras this weekend -- De Rosario would have been representing his country instead of with the Dynamo Tuesday night.
That yellow card in a 2-1 loss Sept. 10 at Tuxtla GutiŠ¹rrez, Mexico, sealed his fate as a substitute for Nate Jaqua in the 78th minute Tuesday night. And the rest, as they say, is history.
But his thoughts were not centered on winning the game right away. No, De Rosario -- perhaps more used to having been on the field from the start -- worked his way into the limelight in the team's first home game in exactly one month.
"Mainly I have to just slowly work myself into the game," said De Rosario. "I know the time was short right there, but when you come into the game that late, you have to make the most of every opportunity you are given to you.
"The main thing for me was to go out there and put the other team under pressure and get them back on their heels again ... I thought their defense was a little 'leggy' at that point, and my job was go out there, get the ball wide and keep pressure on. Eventually, I knew something was going to open up."
Even after Wondolowski scored early in the match, the Dynamo had many opportunities to extend their lead. But just like so many times earlier in the season, the team was forced to work around one near miss after another.
But as the game wore on, and after a poor start to the second half yielded their opponents' only score, the Dynamo looked like a team prepared to do what they have done all season.
Rebound, score late, and somehow get the win or tie when logic said otherwise. Tony Caig's miscue -- playing out too far on a chip shot by Temistocles Perez in the 47th minute -- did not leave the team rattled.
It just set up what has become the norm for the Men in Orange.
"Really, though, I think it is just the attitude and the character of these guys to just play to the end," said Dynamo head coach Dominic Kinnear. "I don't know how many games this year that we have won or tied by scoring late, but it has been quite a few.
"And whether or not we are behind or are ahead, I always think we try to play the same way. I think their goal did stun us a little bit, and I don't think we started the second half really well. Their goal definitely caught us by surprise, and the game really appeared to be destined for a tie."
And it was until De Rosario picked the proverbial pocket of San Francisco defender Alberto Blanco -- in the split-second that Blanco took his eye off De Rosario -- and sent a stunning shot into the net. For a split second, it did not look like De Rosario's teammates could believe what just had happened.
"I saw when (Blanco) got the ball he wasn't really looking behind him," said De Rosario. "I kind of snuck up on him, got the ball and as soon as I turned, I saw that I had some space in front of me. I kind of pushed it to the side and I saw that the goalie was screened a little bit.
"I tried to pick (the top right corner), hit it and thankfully it went in the back of the net."
With the win, the Dynamo moved into a first-place tie in Group B with Pumas UNAM. Both teams have five points with a 1-0-2 record. Pumas takes on CD Luis Angel Firpo at home on Thursday, then the Mexican club travels to Robertson Stadium to take on the Dynamo on Wednesday, Oct. 22. The teams played to a wild 4-4 draw last week in Mexico City.
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