Tag: mls

D.C. United, Houston, New England and Chivas USA have clinched playoff spots. More can join them this week.

[MLS STATISTICS] Last weekend, announced attendances at games hosted by Toronto, Chicago and Los Angeles exceeded 20,000 and the league-wide average inched past the 16,000 mark with four weeks left in the season. The last regular season in which MLS attendance averaged more than 16,000 was the inaugural 1996 season (17,406).

[MLS WEEKEND WRAP] Chivas USA stung Kansas City with a stoppage-time goal to move into the Western Conference lead; Chicago’s tie with D.C. United keeps it a point ahead of ninth-place Columbus, which rallied for a win in Toronto; New York needed a rally at home to tie New England; Real Salt Lake dinged Colorado’s playoff hopes with a 1-0 win; and THE GALAXY BEATS DALLAS!!!

[TV PREVIEW] Most of the time, a road point is cause for rejoicing, but nobody on the Fire was hopping around Thursday night at Pizza Hut Park after a 1-1 tie.

[TV PREVIEW] Spoiler is about the only role the Galaxy can play down the stretch as it seeks to salvage some pride at home, where it has won only one of the last five league games. It has lost to Dallas twice (2-1 and 3-1) this season in the pre-Beckham era and hasn’t been able to transform its stirring effort in the SuperLiga into league success.

Up until the final seconds of the match, FC Dallas defender Clarence Goodson had been almost as threatening an attacker as Carlos Ruiz. But in those final seconds, Goodson flicked on a long ball that sent Ruiz free into the penalty area, where he dodged past Chicago keeper Matt Pickens and slammed a shot through two defenders into the net for the tying goal. Chicago, seeking its first win ever in Dallas, instead settled for 1-1 tie that improved its record slightly to 8-10-7 and left it with only two-point lead over Columbus and Colorado in the race for eighth place in the overall standings. All three teams have five games to play.

[TV PREVIEW] The Crew are fighting for a playoff spot yet Toronto FC has yet to be officially eliminated from postseason contention, and despite a inexorable goalless streak that seems to pre-date the franchise itself, it will come out charged up, as always.

[TV PREVIEW] New York can clinch a playoff spot and just as importantly prove it can beat the three-time MLS Cup finalist New England, which it has been unable to do in two previous meetings this season. These two teams could very well be paired as the No. 2 and No. 3 seeds in the Eastern Conference semifinals.

[TV PREVIEW] Like the Crew, the Rapids have slipped in and out of the eighth playoff place and face a rugged road game against an opponent with nothing to lose.

[TV PREVIEW] The Wizards will get an up-close lesson on how to defend and still be dangerous in the attack. They have allowed 39 goals this season. Only the Galaxy has given up more. Chivas USA has conceded just 22 goals in 24 games – second only to Houston in the stingy department – yet have scored 39, one fewer than Kansas City.

Forget about the playoff implications of Wednesday’s night Real Salt Lake-Los Angeles showdown. They’re aren’t any and never were any, save for the mathematical madness of possible points accrued minus potential points squandered by bubble teams multiplied by variance in the number of games to be played. Playing for pride and next year’s contracts, and a nice and noisy crowd of 24,633 given fair and sufficient warning of David Beckham’s absence, the Gals and Real swapped penalty kicks and golazos to end up tied, 2-2.

[TV PREVIEW] Since taking over the Fire, head coach Juan Carlos Osorio’s team has posted a 4-2-2 record and edged into the playoff octet. To stay there it will need better performances in its last six games, as no team chasing a postseason spot has a tougher schedule.

[MLS STATISTICS] The Los Angeles Galaxy has chance to climb out of the Western Conference cellar when it travels to Real Salt Lake on Wednesday (9 pm ET, live, DirectKick & HDNet). D.C. United, New England and defending champ Houston have clinched playoff spots. Brazilian Luciano Emilio has already scored more goals than the league’s leading scorers of the past four seasons.

The Associated Press reports that the Los Angeles Galaxy will travel to Australia and New Zealand for exhibition games against Sydney FC on Nov. 27 and the Wellington Phoenix in early December. David Beckham is expected to have recovered from his knee and ankle injuries by then.

Kudos to MLS for adding a new award category this year, a prize of far more interest to fans than the internally driven Executive of the Year and the like. (Incidentally, for filling nearly every seat for the entire season at BMO Field, Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment is the hands-down choice. Well done. Runner-up is that ticket-seller extraordinaire, David Beckham.)

The Newcomer of the Year is open to all players who joined the league in 2007. It is not restricted in any away — as is the Rookie of the Year Award to first-year professionals — and is an obvious adjunct to the league’s adoption of the Designated Player option. So important have some newcomers been to their teams this season they deserve serious mention as MVP candidates as well.

Houston won and Chivas USA tied, so the defending champion Dynamo is back in first place; Kansas City stuns Columbus with two goals in stoppage time; New England tops Dallas in a preview of the U.S. Open Cup; Colorado and Chicago rally to earn ties despite being down to 10 men; and the Toronto barren run continues. Soccer America’s Ridge Mahoney reports on all of the weekend’s MLS action …

[MLS PREVIEW] Toronto, scoreless in the last 732 minutes and winless in nine games, hosts Real Salt Lake.

[MLS PREVIEW] They’ve posted the same number of wins playing vastly different styles: the Revs seldom sparkle but can split open opponents, while FC Dallas is adding South American artisans as fast as it can.

[MLS PREVIEW] The Wizards sit seventh in the overall standings and have conceded 37 goals, which ties them with Toronto FC and Real Salt Lake as the league’s most porous defenses. The Crew is tied for ninth with Colorado, a point behind Chicago, and has failed to win any of its last six games.

[MLS PREVIEW] Coach Juan Carlos Osorio has won four of seven games since replacing Dave Sarachan but crunch time is at hand.
Next week, Chicago plays at Dallas and hosts D.C.; against those two teams and New York, it is a combined 0-4 in 2007, and it also must play D.C. again in October.

[MLS PREVIEW] These teams are at opposite ends of the Western Conference, yet both lost excruciating penalty-kick tiebreakers to Pachuca in the SuperLiga, so how different can they be? Well, a lot. They haven’t played since a 0-0 tie at Robertson Stadium way back on April 8; so much has happened since.

David Beckham will be in the ESPN2 commentary booth as his Galaxy mates try to climb out of the Western Conference cellar. Riding a one-game winning streak after beating Colorado, 3-1, last Saturday, the Galaxy will have Landon Donovan back after he played a role on both U.S. goals in a 4-2 loss to Brazil. The victory broke a six-game losing streak in MLS play and reversed a humiliating 3-0 loss to Colorado during the skid. … Soccer America’s Ridge Mahoney previews the Clasico and explains the Beckham rumors …

No Jaime Moreno, no problem. With the league’s all-time leading scorer away on international duty, D.C. United widened its lead atop the Eastern Conference and overall MLS standings by beating Real Salt Lake, 2-1, with goals by Luciano Emilio and Christian Gomez. D.C. (15-6-4) officially clinched a playoff spot, which had hardly been in doubt, and also increased its unbeaten streak to nine games. Yet the victory – its eighth in that nine-game run – is among the toughest D.C. has carved out this season.