Efforts of Wayne

If you're online and remotely into sports, you've already seen this. It was a SportsCenter Top 10 selection on Sunday evening. We're not breaking news here.

But this play was so spectacular, and so unexpected, that it's worth a half-assed Gheorghian treatment.

I can't believe it, either

Once the class of MLS, D.C. United is today a mediocre side. Pants, if you will. Headed into Sunday's match against Orlando City, United were in last place in the Eastern Conference by five points. To be fair, they've played significantly fewer matches than the average team, and an overwhelming majority of their matches thus far have been played away from home as construction was wrapped up on Audi Field, the club's new home.

Over the past several seasons, the club's developed a reputation for poor management, tight purse-strings, and lousy on-field results. That's starting to change, as the new stadium comes online and new ownership with professional sports experience takes over. DCU picked up U.S. national Paul Arriola last season as a step forward.

And last month, the club added international legend Wayne Rooney, which felt at the time as much of a marketing tactic as anything else.

It doesn't feel like that any longer.

Deep into second-half stoppage time against Orlando, with the match tied at 2 (Orlando equalized through Dom Dwyer despite playing with only 10 men for most of the second half), DCU won a corner kick. Head coach Ben Olsen waived goalkeeper Dave Ousted into the penalty box, pushing all 11 players forward in a desperate attempt to earn a critical three points.

The risk a team runs in pushing that many players forward is obvious. A quick clearance can lead to a counterattack against an empty net.

Cue quick clearance. Cue counterattack. Cue Orlando City three-on-one break, with Rooney - who's 32, with a million miles on his odometer, having started playing in the Premier League as a 16 year-old - as the only thing standing in the way of a devastating loss for his side. Freeze the video below at the 0:13 mark - all Orlando's Will Johnson needed to do was whip the ball into the center of the field, and either of two teammates would've walked it in. (And if you want to see desperation, check out Ousted's pellmell sprint to get back to his goal at around the 0:49 mark.)

You know what happened next. Rooney sprinted 40 yards, made a saving tackle along the sideline, sprung to his feet, took three rapid touches forward, and launched an inch-perfect cross-field diagonal ball onto the head of 5'3" Luciano Acosta, who leapt over a defender and nodded the ball into the side of the net for his third goal of the game.



Madness ensued. At Audi Field and in my living room. I watch more MLS than most people (which isn't saying all that much), and I'm quite sure I've never been as dumbfounded, never leapt to my feet involuntarily by a play in our domestic league. It might well have been the most remarkable soccer play I've ever seen.

As the bloggers at Black & Red United said (with cool accompanying screenshot), "That’s 32 year old, multi-million-dollar Premier League import Wayne Rooney. The number nine. The guy people said was past it. He’s the one having to make a 50 yard sprint this far into stoppage time on a muggy night to prevent a bad draw from turning into a worse loss."

I never fancied myself much of a Wayne Rooney fan, but after watching that effort, and hearing more and more about the level of professionalism and commitment he's brought to D.C. in his short tenure, I'm sold.

Sports are cool.