Roland Alberg doesn’t need time to find his way into a match. He doesn’t even really need to set his feet, apparently.
Alberg just swings his legs and this magic happens on his first touch.
First touch after stepping on the field. That's bold.#JoinOrDie pic.twitter.com/fXf7ffnnnQ
Major League Soccer is home to some miserable road teams, with four squads failing to win a single away fixture about halfway through the season.
Two of those sides met Saturday night in Denver. Marlon Hairston scored twice and Tim Howard came up with some big saves as the Rapids beat the Dynamo 3-1, leaving Houston 0-7-2 on the road.
Houston, Minnesota and Colorado all have seven road losses without a win, though the former two have both drawn twice. New England is 0-6-3 away from home.
Minnesota United ventured to Yankee Stadium on Thursday and, as has been the case on their travels all season, got thumped. Christian Ramirez capitalized on an error from New York City FC goalkeeper Erik Johanen to give Minnesota an early lead, but goals from Alexander Callens, Jack Harrison and a lovely individual effort from David Villa put NYCFC ahead for good with just over an hour gone.
A record-setting crowd of 32,287 packed into FC Cincinnati’s Nippert Stadium to watch their club take on surging MLS side Chicago Fire in the Round of 16 of the U.S. Open Cup. Perhaps there’s no greater barometer for the growth of the sport in America than the fact that this wasn’t just a quirky Wednesday night excursion to the stadium to watch Bastian Schweinsteiger for FCC faithful, this was a seething cauldron of tensions and daring expectancies.
Aside from a two-year stint at Real Madrid, Wesley Sneijder always plays for clubs below what his talent prescribes. He appears ready to continue that trend by coming to America.
Toronto FC furthered its record as the most successful club in the history of the 10-year Canadian Championship by winning the competition for a sixth time and confirming their place in the 2018 CONCACAF Champions League. The win was achieved in dramatic fashion with the inspirational Sebastian Giovinco scoring the match-winner in the 95th minute.
An announced crowd of 26,539 was on hand for the second leg at Toronto’s BMO Field with the final finely poised after a 1-1 draw in the first leg at Montreal’s Stade Saputo.
The MLS has said they’d like to implement Video Assistant Referees during the second half of the season, but the Philadelphia Union’s Haris Medunjanin should probably win the MLS Fair Play Award for overturning an incorrect call himself during Saturday’s match between the Union and DC United.
Medunjanin was shielding the ball for a throw-in when some pressure from United’s Luciano Acosta bowled him over near the sideline. The referee marched over, believed he saw Acosta kick-out at Medunjanin on the ground and promptly displayed a straight red.
Ike Opara can't even believe what he's about to do. His face is all scrunched up in a surprised sort of way, the way one looks at the moment of realization that one is about to do something spectacular. And spectacular is the word for what Ike Opara did. The Sporting Kansas City center back will almost certainly lord this goal over all the other center backs for all of time. He will rub it in their faces, when center backs get together.
Without trying to quantify the emotional side plots that make the U.S. Open Cup fifth round meeting between FC Cincinnati and the Chicago Fire so intriguing, we can objectively say that there’s never been a USOC match (at least outside of the final) as eagerly anticipated as this one.
For starters, a record attendance was on hand to watch Cincinnati defeat the Columbus Crew in the fourth round. With over 18,000 tickets having already been sold for Wednesday night’s match, Cincinnati are going to come close to matching or bettering that number.
Approaching the halfway point of the 2017 Major League Soccer season, Minnesota United has already answered two questions that lingered around the expansion club throughout preseason: 1.) Is MNUFC the worst MLS side of all-time? No. Far from it. In fact, with five wins (which is what many predicted would be their grand total for the entire season), they’re only three points out of the playoff picture.