As teams round the final turn in the MLS season, it’s shaping up to be quite a finish.
Four teams look equally capable of winning it all: Miami, San Jose, Chicago and Los Angeles. Seven others will dogfight for four playoff spots, and all have enough weaponry to pull off an upset in a three-game series. Home-field advantage will be strongly coveted.
The reduction of the season to 28 games will be felt between now and mid-September, when the playoffs start. Teams with few games left will not want to settle for ties.
The most enticing aspect of watching this unfold is the quality of soccer that will decide matters. Unlike the early years of MLS, when only games involving D.C. United or Los Angeles could promise imaginative, exciting play, every team in contention this season offers its own reason to watch.
Miami and San Jose have the sentimental draw of having been doormats for so long. Both are winning via attractive team play. The Fusion’s Preki is an aging star with something to prove; the Earthquakes’ Landon Donovan is a burgeoning American youngster – both provide ample flair.
Chicago and Los Angeles are the established MLS powers, each now led by a passionate marquee foreigner. Hristo Stoitchkov and Luis Hernandez are beginning to show their best stuff.
The other seven suitors have their question marks, but any could rise up. Just when the MetroStars seemed to be fading, they walloped Miami, 3-0. Onandi Lowe, Roy Lassiter and Gary Glasgow give Kansas City a frightening frontline. Dallas has the guile of Joselito Vaca and poacher Ariel Graziani. Columbus may not play pretty, but it has a habit of scoring dramatic late goals. Colorado, New England and D.C. United have Jekyll-and-Hyde tendencies but enough talent to put on a show.
And down the stretch they come …
by Soccer America Associate Editor Will Kuhns