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Colorado (6-8-2) at Dallas (4-6-6), 8:30 p.m.

Frisco, TX (Sports Network) - Two of Major League Soccer's more mediocre Western Conference sides, FC Dallas and the Colorado Rapids, square off in an important league fixture on Saturday night at Pizza Hut Park.

Both teams are under .500 but still well within striking distance of the table leaders, meaning every possible point is crucial.

Dallas (4-6-6) is still winless under new head coach Schellas Hyndman, going 0-1-2 since he took over on June 21, but the team has gone almost two weeks since it last league fixture - a 1-1 draw at Houston - to get back in form.

"[That was] a great result," Hyndman said of the draw at Houston. "Don't get me wrong, the exciting thing is that I think there is room for improvement. That's my objective as a coach. I'm happy as I can be with one point because I don't think we played so well. But I'm disappointed that we're not playing to our capability."

Hopefully with the layoff, Hyndman will have had a chance to evaluate his team and find the correct combinations of players to flourish in his system.

"What we have is a little bit of confusion on what we're trying to do and our style," Hyndman said. "What is our style? We like to keep the ball in the middle of the field and don't have anybody running forward to change the point of attack. So, when we do knock the ball forward, it's to the strikers, who are marked. It's something that we tried to address last week is that after you play the ball, run forward. I think we find that in some of our players and some don't. It's hard to read each other. I don't think we're playing very well as a team.

"Width is one of the principles of attack and you need to have it. We had width but it's not where we want it to be. We have flank players who want to play around the center line. I can't tell you how many conversations we've had about them getting into the attacking third. It's just really uncomfortable for these guys. It just comes to the point of doing what we ask you to do or we have to find people."

The Rapids (6-8-2) are coming off a disappointing draw at expansion San Jose in their last league fixture. That came after a 4-0 win over New York snapped a four-game winless streak in league play.

"We thought we did enough; I thought we lost two points today," Rapids coach Fernando Clavijo said after the draw at San Jose. "But we know how this league is. Every game is difficult whether you are playing at home or on the road."

It actually took a late goal by Colorado to even take a point out of the game.

"We needed to get more crosses in throughout the game," Clavijo said. "We finally got one in on the goal. Terry Cooke put a great ball in and Conor (Casey) had a very good finish."