Interview with Kevin Payne

Being in the midst of their worst start in franchise history, the DC United locker room is probably a pretty lonely place right now.

Steven Goff spoke to team president Kevin Payne to address some of the current issues with this year's DC United team-

But shouldn't that be expected from a professional soccer player?

"It's 90 minutes. They might fight on nine out of 10 plays. It's not that they willfully don't fight. They lose a little bit of concentration for a moment and -- bang -- you are punished."

But shouldn't that be an innate ability at this level?

"You would like to think so, but it's not. We discussed yesterday some things to try to get the team focused on results, no matter how ugly they are. Since I have checked the standings recently, we haven't gotten any points [in the standings] for style. We're not worried about that right now. If we get the ship righted and if we add a few players in the summer, maybe then we will try to go back to playing the kind of soccer we want to play. Right now, we just have to fight and scratch and claw and run, do all those little things to keep the other team from scoring goals."

Santino Quaranta alluded to that the other day.

"I don't think we have earned the right to play good soccer. It's a little more fun to play that kind of soccer. I don't think we've earned the right, and more to the point, it's not working. If it's not working, you have to try something else. I am not the one who sets tactics, but I think there is a mentality generally that we just have to become much harder to play against."

I always reference to our players that the margin of error between victory and defeat is very small, and that it is the little things that make up that margin. Right now, DC United is trying to find ways to close that gap.